“The situation of Mr Assange does not present an immediate danger”.
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Mr Assange had written an open letter to the president, asking to be taken in by France because he was being “pursued and threatened with death by the U.S. authorities because of my professional activities”.
“My life is in danger,” Assange wrote in a letter to the Socialist president which was published by Le Monde newspaper.
“Julian Assange has not made any request for asylum in France”, said Baltasar Garzon, head of his defence team, in a statement published on the WikiLeaks Twitter feed.
The documents included private conversations by three successive French Presidents and caused a firestorm of political backlash in France. “Furthermore, he is subject to a European arrest warrant”, Hollande’s office said.
French Justice Minister Christiane Taubira said last week that she “wouldn’t be surprised” if France decided to offer asylum to both Assange and US leaker Edward Snowden. The French government has announced today it will not grant asylum to the fugitive.
(CNN) – France has turned down Wikileaks founder Julian Assange’s request for what he called “protection”. He wrote that “only France now has the ability to offer me the necessary protection against, and exclusively against, the political persecution that I am currently the object of”.
Assange, an Australian national, has not been charged in the Swedish case and denies the allegations against him.
Ecuador granted Assange asylum after he said he feared further extradition to the US, where he was wanted in connection with WikiLeaks’ publication of top secret diplomatic cables.
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In rejecting Assange, Hollande has done the opposite, sending a message of disapproval and condemnation to journalists who actually seek to report truthfully and inform the public, rather than take their marching orders from the propaganda offices of the intelligence agencies in Washington, London and Paris.
