WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange has pleaded guilty to US criminal charges as part of a deal that allows him to go free.
A Twitter posting by his company, a few moments ago, announced: “JULIAN ASSANGE IS FREE.”
Assange, 52, was charged with conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defence information.
For years, the US has argued that the WikiLeaks files – which disclosed information about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars – endangered lives.
The full statement on X reads:
“Julian Assange is free. He left Belmarsh maximum security prison on the morning of 24 June, after having spent 1901 days there. He was granted bail by the High Court in London and was released at Stansted airport during the afternoon, where he boarded a plane and departed the UK.
“This is the result of a global campaign that spanned grass-roots organisers, press freedom campaigners, legislators and leaders from across the political spectrum, all the way to the United Nations. This created the space for a long period of negotiations with the US Department of Justice, leading to a deal that has not yet been formally finalised. We will provide more information as soon as possible.
“After more than five years in a 2×3 metre cell, isolated 23 hours a day, he will soon reunite with his wife Stella Assange, and their children, who have only known their father from behind bars.
“WikiLeaks published groundbreaking stories of government corruption and human rights abuses, holding the powerful accountable for their actions. As editor-in-chief, Julian paid severely for these principles, and for the people’s right to know.
“As he returns to Australia, we thank all who stood by us, fought for us, and remained utterly committed in the fight for his freedom.”
He has spent the last five years in a British prison, from where he has been fighting extradition to the US.
According to CBS, the BBC’s US partner, Assange will spend no time in US custody and will receive credit for the time spent incarcerated in the UK.
Assange will return to Australia, according to a letter from the justice department.
The deal – which will see him plead guilty to one charge – is expected to be finalised in a court in the Northern Mariana Islands on Wednesday, 26 June.
The remote Pacific islands, a US commonwealth, are much closer to Australia than US federal courts in Hawaii or the continental US.
Agence France Press quoted a spokesperson for Australia’s government as saying that the case had “dragged on for too long”.
His attorney, Richard Miller, declined to comment when contacted by CBS.
The BBC has also contacted his US-based lawyer.
He and his lawyers had long claimed that the case against him was politically motivated.
In April, US President Joe Biden said that he was considering a request from Australia to drop the prosecution against Assange.
In a victory the following month, the UK High Court ruled that Assange can bring a new appeal against extradition to the US, allowing him to challenge US assurances over how his prospective trial would be conducted and whether his right to free speech would be infringed.
After the ruling, his wife Stella told reporters and supporters that the Biden administration “should distance itself from this shameful prosecution”.
US prosecutors had originally wanted to try the WikiLeaks founder on 18 counts – mostly under the Espionage Act – over the release of confidential US military records and diplomatic messages related to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
WikiLeaks, which Assange founded in 2006, claims to have published over 10 million documents in what the US government later described as “one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of the United States”.
In 2010, the website published a video from a US military helicopter which more than a dozen Iraqi civilians, including two Reuters news reporters, being killed in Baghdad.
One of Assange’s most well-known collaborators, US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning, was sentenced to 35 years in prison before then-president Barack Obama commuted her sentence in 2017.
Assange also faced separate charges of rape and sexual assault in Sweden, which he denied.
He spent seven years hiding in Ecuador’s London embassy, claiming the Swedish case would lead him to be sent to the US.
Swedish authorities dropped the case in 2019 and said that too much time had passed since the original complaint, but UK authorities later took him into custody.
He was tried for not surrendering to the courts to be extradited to Sweden.
Even amid long-running legal battles, Assange has rarely been seen in public and for years has reportedly suffered from ill health, including a small stroke in prison in 2021.
