BANGKOK (AP) — Julian Assange The WikiLeaks founder arrived in Bangkok on Tuesday for fuel as he accepted a plea deal with the U.S. government to resolve a years-long, cross-continental lawsuit over the publication of classified documents. Mountain of classified documents.
A charter flight from London, which Assange’s wife Stella identified as carrying her husband, landed at Don Mueang International Airport. Local authorities told The Associated Press that the plane was headed for Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory in the Pacific, where Assange is due to appear in court on Wednesday.
Protesters hold signs in support of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange outside the High Court in London, Monday, May 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Khin Chun, File)
According to a letter filed with the court by the Department of Justice, the defendant is expected to plead guilty to violating the Espionage Act for conspiring to illegally obtain and disseminate classified defense information.
Assange is expected to return to his native Australia after his arraignment and sentencing. The hearing will take place in Saipan because Assange objects to traveling to the U.S. mainland and because the court is closer to Australia, prosecutors said.
The guilty plea, which must be approved by a judge, marks an abrupt end to a criminal case involving international conspiracy and the U.S. government’s long-running pursuit of the publisher of a wildly popular secret-sharing website who became famous among many press freedom advocates for acting as a journalist exposing wrongdoings in the U.S. military. Investigators, by contrast, have repeatedly argued that his actions violated laws protecting classified information and endangered the country’s national security.
Stella Assange told the BBC from Australia that it had been “hush-hush” over the past 72 hours whether the deal would go ahead but she was “overjoyed” at the news. The lawyer, who married the WikiLeaks founder in prison in 2022, said details of the agreement would be made public once the judge has approved it.
“Once the judge signs it, he’ll be a free man,” she said, adding that she doesn’t believe that’s real yet.
She told Britain’s PA news agency that Assange’s flight would cost $500,000 and that she would launch a fundraising campaign to cover the costs.
WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Kristinn Hrafnsson said the deal with Assange came about because of Australia’s increased involvement. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
“This is the result of a long process that has been going on for a long time. It has been a tough battle but our focus now is on reuniting Julian with his family,” Ms Hrafnsson told the PA news agency. “The most important thing is that Julian is now free and can finally enjoy the wide open blue sky.”
WikiLeaks said in a statement on social media platform X that Assange had boarded a flight on Monday to leave the British prison where he had spent the past five years. WikiLeaks praised the announcement of the agreement and said it was grateful to “all those who supported us, fought for us and continued to do everything in their power for his freedom.”
Mr Albanese told Parliament that an Australian envoy had flown in from London accompanied by Mr Assange.
A building is reflected in a window as WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is led out of court where he appeared on charges of jumping bail in Britain seven years ago, in London, Wednesday, May 1, 2019. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham, File)
“Regardless of what people think about Mr Assange’s activities, this case is dragging on,” Mr Albanese said. “Nothing is gained by continuing to lock him up. We want to bring him back to Australia.”
The deal allows Assange to plead guilty and avoid additional prison time. Hiding for years He was held at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London and then detained in Britain after Swedish authorities sought his arrest on rape charges.
Assange is expected to be sentenced in a series of hearings in London to the five years he spent in a British prison fighting his extradition to the United States. Last month he Challenge the extradition order The lawyers argued that US government assurances that he would be accorded the same freedom of speech protections as a US citizen if extradited from the UK were “manifestly inadequate”.
Assange is hailed by many around the world as a hero for exposing military misconduct in Iraq and Afghanistan. Among the files released by WikiLeaks was footage of a 2007 U.S. Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad that killed 11 people, including two Reuters journalists.
But his reputation has also been tarnished by rape allegations, which he denies.
In a Justice Department indictment unsealed in 2019, Assange Chelsea Manning, U.S. Army Intelligence Analyst Assange stole diplomatic cables and military files that were published by WikiLeaks in 2010. Prosecutors had accused him of undermining national security by publishing documents that harmed the United States and its allies and aided its enemies.
The case was roundly condemned by press advocates and Assange supporters, with federal prosecutors arguing that it targeted activities far beyond journalists’ intelligence gathering and amounted to attempts to solicit, steal and indiscriminately release classified government documents.
The plea deal came a few months later. President Joe Biden Trump said he was considering a request from Australia to drop U.S. efforts to prosecute Assange. A White House official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said the White House was not involved in the decision to resolve Assange’s case.
Assange drew attention again in 2016 when he published Democratic Party emails on his website that prosecutors said were stolen by Russian operatives. He was not indicted as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, which detailed his role in a hacking operation that meddled in that year’s election on behalf of then-Republican candidate Donald Trump.
Under the Obama administration, Justice Department officials considered filing charges against Assange but were unsure whether the charges would stand up in court and worried it might be difficult to justify prosecuting him for the same conduct as any other journalist.
But the tone changed under the Trump administration, with former Attorney General Jeff Sessions calling Assange’s arrest a priority in 2017.
Assange’s family and supporters say his physical and mental health is More than a decade of legal battles.
Assange is Ecuador Embassy He was arrested in London in 2012 and granted political asylum after an English court ruled he should be extradited to Sweden as part of a rape investigation in the Scandinavian country. After the Ecuadorian government revoked his asylum status in 2019, he was arrested by British police and jailed for jumping bail when he first took refuge inside the embassy.
Sweden eventually dropped the sex crimes investigation because of the passage of time, but Assange remains in London’s maximum security Belmarsh prison during his extradition battle with the United States.
___
Tucker reported from Fort Pierce, Florida, and Durkin Richer reported from Washington. Colleen Long in Washington, Napat Khongsawad and David Rising in Bangkok, Jill Lawless and Brian Merry in London and Rod McGurk in Melbourne, Australia contributed to this report.
