As the controversial Julian Assange faces the High Court, this may be his last chance to avoid extradition to the United States, where he could be the first person convicted under the Espionage Act.
Last month, the UK High Court confirmed that his public hearing would take place on February 20 and 21.
If extradited, Assange, 52, faces a sentence of 175 years.
The Wikileaks founder has been held at HMP Belmarsh in London since April 2019, after being forcibly removed from the Ecuadorian embassy when his seven-year diplomatic asylum was revoked.
As his trial progresses, MailOnline documents Julian Assange’s major WikiLeaks revelations, particularly the video that put WikiLeaks in the spotlight.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange leaves Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London, Britain, January 13, 2020
The video that made WIkileaks famous shows images of US Apache helicopters opening fire in Baghdad, Iraq.
In 2010, WikiLeaks released the footage in a 39-minute video titled Collateral Murder.
It was first published during an April 5 press conference at the US National Press Club and WikiLeaks claimed the footage showed the “murder of Iraqi civilians and two Reuters journalists.”
They also stated that the source was “several military whistleblowers.”
The video showed air-to-ground strikes carried out by two US military helicopters on Al-Amin al-Thaniyah, New Baghdad, following the US invasion of Iraq, during the Iraqi insurgency.
One team fired on a group of civilians, killing several, including two Reuters journalists, Iraqis Saeed Chmagh and Namir Noor-Eldeen, before laughing and mocking them.
A second attack was directed at a van driven by Saleh Matasher Tomal, a man who was helping the wounded Chmagh. The two men were killed and two of Tomal’s children were seriously injured.
Images of US military airstrikes in Iraq. In 2010, WikiLeaks released a 39-minute video titled Collateral Murder.
Pictured above is the late Namir Noor-Eldeen, an Iraqi war photojournalist who was killed by the US military during the Iraqi insurgency following their invasion of Iraq.
In the third and final attack, American pilots watched people approach a building before attacking the location with AGM-114 Hellfire missiles.
Throughout the video, victims included journalists and children, resulting in approximately 12 to 18 civilian deaths.
American chat show host Stephen Colbert accused Assange of editorializing the video headline Collateral Murder, an accusation with which Assange agreed.
In the following years, the group published a series of leaks provided by US military intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning.
The leaks included a total of 75,000 documents related to the war in Afghanistan and approximately 390,000 Army field reports related to the Iraq War.
In 2011, Assange released the Guantanamo Files after receiving information from Manning, a year after she leaked war records from Afghanistan and Iraq.
The 779 secret documents detailed the treatment given to captive prisoners in the Cuban military prison.
They included classified evaluations and interviews written by the Pentagon’s Joint Task Force at Guantánamo.
The confidential documents were clearly marked “secret” and also labeled NOFORN (not disclosable to foreign nationals).
An Army soldier stands at the entrance to Camp Delta, where detainees from the U.S. war in Afghanistan live, April 7, 2004 in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The documents, believed to have been released by Manning in 2010, revealed the harsh conditions to which detainees were allegedly subjected, and also alleged that many were wrongfully convicted.
Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison for leaking the files before Barack Obama reduced her sentence in 2017 and released her.
WikiLeaks also exposed members of the BNP and sensitive details in 2009: the British National Party.
This included the members’ phone numbers and addresses in addition to their names.
Thousands of names were included and source and then BNP chairman Nick Griffin claimed the anonymous source who leaked the information was a former senior employee.
Members included police officers, religious leaders, doctors and teachers. British police officers are banned from joining the BNP and at least one officer was dismissed from the force as a result of the leak.
