Brazilian president-elect Lula reaffirms his desire to release Julian Assange

elected President of Brazil stressed his continued support for the campaign to free WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
Mr. da Silva met with Kristin Hrafnsson, Editor-in-Chief of WikiLeaks, and Joseph Farrell, Ambassador of WikiLeaks, in a private meeting in the Brasilia capital.
Mr. da Silva, a former political prisoner, has long spoken openly about .
A man stands and speaks into a microphone.

Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has said he supports the campaign to free WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Source: AARP, EPA / Sebastian Moreira

Mr. Assange is wanted by the United States authorities in connection with the leak of documents in 2010 and 2011 related to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

At the meeting, Mr. da Silva confirmed his desire to release the Australian.
The WikiLeaks delegation will be received in the Brazilian Parliament on Tuesday (local time) by Humberto Costa, President of the Senate Commission on Human Rights, and will address the lower house plenary with parliamentarians to agree on a set of actions. – including the parliamentarians who submitted a letter to the US embassy in Brasilia urging Washington to drop the charges against Mr. Assange.
On Wednesday, the delegation will travel to Rio de Janeiro, where they will hold an open meeting.
This came after leading US and European media urged Washington to stop persecuting Mr. Assange.
“This accusation sets a dangerous precedent and threatens to undermine America’s First Amendment and freedom of the press,” said the editors and publishers of The Guardian, The New York Times, Le Monde, Der Spiegel and El Pais. .
Monday marked twelve years since these media outlets jointly published excerpts from more than 250,000 documents obtained by Mr. Assange in the so-called “Cablegate” leak.
Mr Assange is being held at Belmarsh Prison in London, where he is seeking extradition to the US.
He lived in the Ecuadorian embassy in London for seven years from 2012 before being pulled out.

He fears a life sentence if extradited.