Albanese reiterated previous calls for the US to drop its case against Assange, saying "there is nothing to be gained" from the Australian citizen's continued detention.

"We continue to work very closely to see that that is achieved," the Australian prime minister told reporters.

Albanese has previously said that the prosecution of Julian Assange "cannot continue indefinitely".

On Monday, Lord Justice Timothy Holroyde and Mr Justice Jeremy Johnson of the High Court in London ruled Assange has grounds to appeal the British government's extradition order.

A date for the appeal has not yet been set, but it is likely to prolong the case by several more months.

Assange, who has been held on remand in London's high-security Belmarsh Prison since 2019, did not appear in court due to ill physical and mental health.

In a March ruling, the court found three of the nine grounds of Assange's appeal against extradition were valid and required further assurances from the US authorities.

In their March 26 decision, the judges gave Assange conditional permission to appeal parts of his case unless Washington provided assurances that he could invoke the US constitution's First Amendment, which protects freedom of speech, and would be treated like an American citizen. The court also sought guarantees that the death penalty would not be imposed.

The US has charged Assange with 18 counts of espionage and computer hacking over WikiLeaks' publication of secret files in 2010 and 2011 that exposed alleged war crimes by the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan.

At Monday's hearing in the British capital, Assange's lawyers argued the US had given "manifestly inadequate" assurances.

Washington wants to try Assange over the release of more than 700,000 classified documents and he is charged under the US Espionage Act of 1917, which carries a potential prison sentence of up to 175 years.

Assange was arrested by British police in 2019 after spending seven years inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where he had sought refuge to avoid being extradited to Sweden, where he was wanted for questioning over an alleged rape. He has been held on remand in London's high-security Belmarsh Prison in south-east London ever since.

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