Key Points
- WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is facing a US court room in Saipan.
- He has plead guilty to one charge.
- The court hearing brings relief to Assange’s family, ending a 14-year saga over the leaking of secret state information.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has pleaded guilty to a criminal charge in Saipan, a United States territory, 14 years after he leaked troves of secret state information and ended up in a British maximum security prison.
The saga that started with Assange holed up in Ecuador’s London embassy, before leading him to solitary confinement in Belmarsh prison in the United Kingdom, now looks set to end in a Pacific tropical paradise.
Assange arrived alongside his support team and Australia’s ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd at the US District Court in Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands, just before 8am.
When court resumed after 9am, he was given his oath, introduced his full name to the court and swore to tell the truth.
Chief judge Ramona Manglona told the court that Assange was facing a charge of “conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defence information”, the ABC reports.
The 52-year-old has pleaded guilty to the specific charge, which is a violation of 18 USC, section 793(g) and carries a maximum penalty of up to 10 years in prison.
The ABC reports that the US federal court has accepted the guilty plea from Assange and is now on a break.
What will happen next?
While the charge carries a prison sentence, Assange will be released soon after the court hearing, with time served in a British prison taken into account.
Once the proceedings are over, WikiLeaks and his family say Assange will be free to return to Australia.
Wikileaks posted Assange’s flight path to social media platform X, revealing he will board a flight to Canberra less than three hours after the hearing commenced.
His family, including father John Shipton, are overjoyed to be reunited with Assange.
“Doing cartwheels is a good expression of the joy that one feels that Julian is returned home, well, about to return home,” he told ABC News on Wednesday morning.
“There may be some questions to be resolved by the lawyers and the diplomats in the future but having Julian home to an ordinary life after 15 years of incarceration in one form or another — house arrest, jail and asylum in an embassy — is pretty good news.”
What has the reaction been?
Australia had long called for the US to end its pursuit of Assange, who faced spying charges.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had directly raised the issue with US President Joe Biden and a group of politicians from across Australia’s political spectrum converged on Washington in September to lobby US decision-makers.
“Regardless of the views that people have about Mr Assange’s activities, the case has dragged on for too long,” Albanese said.
Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce commended the “good outcome”, going as far as saying the US government had overstepped the line by trying to convict Assange.
“If you don’t break an offence in Australia, then citizenship would say there’s no threat of you being imprisoned in a third country. That’s the premise of my argument,” he told ABC News Breakfast on Wednesday.
Former US vice president Mike Pence wrote on X that the plea deal a “miscarriage of justice”.
“There should be no plea deals to avoid prison for anyone that endangers the security of our military or the national security of the United States. Ever,” he said.
Assange’s family praises government ahead of reunion
Shipton praised the Australian government for its efforts to end the “persecution” of his son.
“I am absolutely elated — it is as though a huge burden has been lifted,” he told the PA news agency.
Assange’s mother, Christine Assange, said his release showed “the importance and power of quiet diplomacy”.
“Many have used my son’s situation to push their own agendas, so I am grateful to those unseen, hard-working people who put Julian’s welfare first,” she said.
“The past 14 years has obviously taken a toll on me as a mother.”
Assange’s wife Stella said while there had been uncertainty about the situation leading up to her husband being released from prison, she was “elated” by the developments.
On Tuesday night, she made a public call for donations to pay the $US520,000 ($783,000) fee for the jet bringing her husband home.
