Julian Assange: Supporters to stage bike protest in campaign of Wikileaks founder’s release

Campaigners pressing for the release of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will stage a bike protest in London this weekend.

A mass bike ride from Belmarsh Prison will take place on Saturday (September 23). The group will cycle from the prison to the Royal Courts of Justice to deliver Assange’s Walkley Award.

The Walkley Award is Australia’s premier media award and was presented to WikiLeaks in 2011 for the ‘most outstanding contribution to journalism’.

Assange is being held in London’s Belmarsh Prison as he continues to mount a legal challenge to being extradited to the United States.

He faces a 175-year sentence if he is extradited.

Major free speech and human rights organisations oppose his extradition which they say is a “threat to press freedom around the globe”.

Amnesty International said: “Were Julian Assange to be extradited or subjected to any other transfer to the USA, Britain would be in breach of its obligations under international human rights law.”

Assange faces extradition for his publication of disclosed documents as part of his work with Wikileaks.

He was dragged out of the Ecuador Embassy in London in 2019 after spending years inside the building to avoid extradition, and has since been held in Belmarsh Prison.

Protestors say that they hope to remind the judges that Assange is a multiple award winning journalist and that attempts to prosecute him will endanger the freedom of the press.

The protest bike ride will leave Belmarsh prison at 2pm on Saturday September 23 stopping at Cutty Sark at 2:30pm, The Tower of London at 3:30pm and arriving at the Royal Courts of Justice at 4pm.