WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has agreed to plead guilty to one count of conspiring to obtain and disclose information related to the national defense in a U.S. federal court in Saipan, in the Northern Mariana Islands. The plea deal is part of an agreement with the Justice Department that will allow Assange to avoid imprisonment.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has entered into a plea deal with the Justice Department that will allow him to avoid imprisonment, according to newly filed federal court documents.
Assange will plead guilty to one count of conspiring to obtain and disclose information related to the national defense in a U.S. federal court in Saipan, in the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. commonwealth in the Pacific, this week, according to newly filed court papers.
WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange Enters Plea Deal to Avoid Imprisonment
The charges stem from one of the largest publications of classified information in American history. In 2010, WikiLeaks published a trove of classified U.S. military and diplomatic documents, which were provided by former U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning. The documents revealed details of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as U.S. diplomatic cables from around the world.
The publication of the documents caused a major embarrassment for the U.S. government and led to investigations by the FBI and the Justice Department. Assange was indicted by a grand jury in 2010 on charges of espionage and conspiracy to commit espionage.
Assange has been fighting extradition to the United States since 2012, when he was arrested in London on a Swedish warrant for questioning in a sexual assault case. Assange spent five years in a British prison fighting extradition to the United States.
In 2017, Assange was granted asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where he remained for nearly five years. In April 2019, Ecuador revoked Assange's asylum and he was arrested by British police. He has been held in jail in London ever since.
The plea deal is a major victory for Assange, who has always maintained that he is a journalist and that the publication of the classified documents was in the public interest. The plea deal also represents a significant shift in the Justice Department's approach to the case.
In recent years, the Justice Department has been criticized for its aggressive pursuit of journalists and whistleblowers. However, the plea deal with Assange suggests that the Justice Department is now willing to take a more lenient approach to cases involving the publication of classified information.
It is not yet clear what sentence Assange will receive. The maximum penalty for the charge he is pleading guilty to is five years in prison. However, it is likely that Assange will receive a lesser sentence, given his cooperation with the government and the fact that he is a first-time offender.
The plea deal is a major development in the long-running case against Julian Assange. It is a victory for Assange, who has avoided imprisonment, and it represents a shift in the Justice Department's approach to cases involving the publication of classified information.
