Lawyer: Trump offered to pardon Julian Assange if he said Russia was not involved in hacking Democratic Party servers

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was offered a pardon by US President Donald Trump if he stated that Russia had nothing to do with the hacking of the US Democratic Party servers . This was reported by Assange's defense during technical hearings in the case of his extradition to the US, The Guardian reports.

According to his lawyers, Assange received such an offer in 2017 from Dana Rohrabacher, then a Republican member of Congress, who was called "Putin's favorite congressman" by the American media. Rohrabacher assured Assange that he was acting on behalf of Donald Trump.

According to The Daily Beast, Assange's defense team believes that the pardon offer proves that the criminal prosecution of the Wikileaks founder in the United States is politically motivated and that he cannot be extradited to that country.

In 2017, The Wall Street Journal wrote that Rohrabacher offered the White House to pardon Assange if he provided evidence that Russia was not involved in hacking the Democratic Party servers. Rohrabacher then said that the White House blocked his initiative. The US President said that he had not heard of it.

Updated : White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said Trump was unaware of Rohrabacher's offer to pardon Assange.

• Julian Assange spent seven years in hiding in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. In April 2019, he was arrested and sentenced to 50 weeks in prison for breaching bail conditions.
• The United States is seeking the extradition of Julian Assange, who is accused of conspiracy to commit computer hacking and illegally obtaining and publishing classified information.