WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will plead guilty under an agreement that allows him to walk free and avoid a prison sentence in the U.S., according to multiple outlets, doing so after spending more than 10 years fighting extradition to the U.S. after he published classified military documents.
Assange’s plea deal must still be approved by a judge. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images)
Getty Images
A U.K. court ruled in March that Assange could not be extradited to the U.S. immediately and could continue appealing his extradition unless the U.S. guaranteed him “the same First Amendment protections as a United States citizen, and that the death penalty is not imposed.” The U.S. was given until April 16 to make the guarantees, which it did.
Assange has agreed to plead guilty to one count of conspiring to obtain and disclose information related to the national defence, NPR reported.
Assange is also expected to be served with a 62-month prison sentence that equals and will credit the amount of time he has been imprisoned at a high-security prison in London, according to CNN, which noted the deal means Assange will return to his home country of Australia.
News of the plea deal, which is pending the approval of a federal judge, comes a few months after President Joe Biden said the U.S. was “considering” the end of Assange’s prosecution.
Tangent
A U.K. court ruled in March that Assange could not be extradited to the U.S. immediately and could continue appealing his extradition unless the U.S. guaranteed him “the same First Amendment protections as a United States citizen, and that the death penalty is not imposed.” The U.S. was given until April 16 to make the guarantees, which it did.
Key background
Assange, 52, has been fighting extradition to the U.S. since 2010, when his website WikiLeaks released hundreds of thousands of classified military documents regarding the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
He was granted political asylum by Ecuador in 2012 after he was arrested in London and posted bail after being charged by Swedish authorities on unrelated allegations of sexual misconduct, which were later dropped.
Assange spent seven years living at the Ecuadorian embassy in London before he eventually lost asylum and was arrested by local police and sentenced to more than two years in prison in 2019 for failing to appear in court after posting bail in 2012.
The U.S. Justice Department then charged Assange in an 18-count superseding indictment related to his “alleged role in one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of the United States,” and he has remained in prison since then.
Throughout this year, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had called for the U.S. to drop the charges against Assange as Australian lawmakers passed a motion calling for him to be allowed to return home.
