Edward Snowden asks Trump to pardon Wikileaks founder Julian Assange – ZDNet

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden took to Twitter today to ask US President Donald Trump to pardon Wikileaks founder Julian Assange during his last days in office.

"Mr. President, if you grant only one act of clemency during your time in office, please: free Julian Assange. You alone can save his life," Snowdentweeted.

Assange, who has gained international fame for founding the WikiLeaks portal, is currently in custody in London, UK.

He wasarrested in April 2019for breaking pre-trial release conditions in a 2012 UK case.

At the time, Assange absconded and requested political asylum in the Ecuador embassy in London, where he lived until his arrest in 2019 when Ecuadorian officials withdrew the WikiLeaks founder's asylum status.

US authoritiesformally charged Assangefor conspiring to leak US classified materials a month after his arrest. The indictment was updated a month later to include accusations that Assangetried to recruit famous hacker groupslike Anonymous and LulzSec to carry out hacks on his behalf and steal sensitive files to publish on WikiLeaks.

The WikiLeaks founder has been fighting the extradition case ever since his arrest, but a first ruling is expectedon January 4, 2021.

Assange has repeatedly threatened to commit suicide if extradited to the US, threats that his lawyers have been using as the central piece of their defense case and the reason why Snowden mentioned that a pardon from Trump would save Assange's life.

Trump previously also considered pardoning bothSnowdenandAssange.

Last week, Tulsi Gabbard, a House representative for the state of Hawaii, also asked Trump topardon both Assange and Snowden. In October, Gabbard also introduced a bill to have the2013 legal case against Edward Snowden droppedand allow the former NSA threat analyst to return to the US.

However, the pardon requests may come at a bad time for Trump, recently embroiled in abribery-for-pardon scheme.

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Edward Snowden asks Trump to pardon Wikileaks founder Julian Assange - ZDNet