After a prolonged legal battle spanning several years, Wikileaks has announced that its founder Julian Assange has departed the United Kingdom following a negotiated agreement with American authorities.
Under this deal, Assange, aged 52, has agreed to plead guilty to charges related to conspiracy in the acquisition and disclosure of national defense information.
The United States has long contended that Wikileaks’ disclosures, which included sensitive details about the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, posed significant risks to lives.
Assange had been held in a British prison for the past five years, contesting efforts by the US to extradite him.
Reports from CBS, the BBC’s US affiliate, indicate that Assange will not serve any additional time in US custody, and his detention period in the UK will be credited towards any sentence. According to information from the justice department, Assange will be returning to Australia.
Wikileaks confirmed via X, formerly known as Twitter, that Assange departed from Belmarsh prison on Monday after spending 1,901 days confined in a small cell.
He was then “released at Stansted airport during the afternoon, where he boarded a plane and departed the UK” to return to Australia, the statement added.
Video shared online by Wikileaks appear to show Assange, dressed in jeans and a blue shirt, being driven to Stansted before boarding an aircraft.
The BBC has been unable to independently verify the video.
His wife, Stella Assange, tweeted thanks to his supporters “who have all mobilised for years and years to make this come true”.
An agreement, where he will admit to a single charge, is set to be formalized in a Northern Mariana Islands court on Wednesday, June 26. These Pacific islands, part of the US commonwealth, are significantly nearer to Australia than federal courts in Hawaii or the mainland US.
Agence France Press quoted a spokesperson for Australia’s government as saying that the case had “dragged on for too long”.
Richard Miller, Assange’s attorney, refrained from providing any comments when approached by CBS. The BBC also sought input from his legal representative based in the United States.
Throughout the legal proceedings, Assange and his legal team consistently argued that the charges against him were driven by political motives.
In April, US President Joe Biden acknowledged that he was reviewing a request from Australia to dismiss the prosecution against Assange.
In a significant development the following month, the UK High Court granted Assange permission to launch a fresh appeal against extradition to the US.
This decision allows him to challenge the assurances provided by US authorities regarding the conduct of his potential trial and the protection of his freedom of speech rights.
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 released a video filmed from a US military helicopter that depicted the deaths of over a dozen Iraqi civilians, including two Reuters journalists, in Baghdad.
Chelsea Manning, a prominent collaborator with Assange, was sentenced to 35 years in prison for leaking classified documents. Her sentence was later commuted by then-President Barack Obama in 2017.
Apart from his involvement in the leaked video, Assange also faced legal accusations of rape and sexual assault in Sweden, which he consistently denied.
To avoid extradition to Sweden, Assange sought asylum in Ecuador’s London embassy, where he remained in hiding for seven years. He argued that extradition would lead to subsequent extradition to the US for his involvement in the leaked materials.
In 2019, Swedish authorities dropped their investigation into the allegations, citing the passage of time since the initial complaint.
However, UK authorities subsequently arrested Assange for failing to surrender to the courts during the extradition proceedings to Sweden.
Throughout these prolonged legal battles, Assange has maintained a low profile and has reportedly experienced deteriorating health, including suffering a minor stroke while in prison in 2021.
