The CIA and former CIA Director Mike Pompeo were sued Monday for spying on U.S. lawyers and journalists who met with Julian Assange while he was living in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he had political asylum. The lawsuit is being filed as Britain prepares to extradite the WikiLeaks founder to the United States, where he faces up to 175 years in prison for violating the Espionage Act by publishing classified documents exposing U.S. war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Assange spent nearly seven years inside the embassy, from 2012 ’til April 2019, when Metropolitan Police entered the embassy, arrested him, after Ecuador revoked his political asylum.
The lawsuit filed Monday accuses the Spanish security firm UC Global of spying on Assange and his visitors inside the embassy on behalf of the CIA. UC Global and the company’s director, David Morales, are also named as defendants in the new lawsuit, which comes less than a year after Yahoo News revealed the CIA considered abducting, and possibly assassinating, Assange while he was in the embassy.
— source democracynow.org | Aug 16, 2022