Julian Assange free after agreeing to guilty plea

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has been released from prison and allowed to leave the UK after agreeing to plead guilty to violating US espionage laws.

Under the terms of the deal, he will appear in a federal court in the Northern Mariana Island, a US territory in the Pacific, tomorrow morning, where he is expected to plead guilty to one charge of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified US defence documents. Prosecutors are not seeking any further prison time in addition to the 62 months he has spent in HMP Belmarsh. 

The location of the hearing was chosen "because of Assange’s opposition to travelling to the continental US and the court’s proximity to Australia", the Associated Press said.

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A video posted on social media yesterday evening shows Assange boarding a chartered flight from London's Stansted airport. The total cost of the journey, which also includes a stop in Bangkok, is estimated at $500,000 (£393,715), said the BBC. His wife, Stella, said that the Australian government has agreed to cover the cost, which will be repaid by fundraising.

An Australian government spokesperson said Canberra was "aware" of the legal proceedings, adding: "Prime Minister [Anthony] Albanese has been clear – Mr Assange's case dragged on for too long and there was nothing to be gained by his continued incarceration."

The decision seems to bring to a close the long-running legal saga – which has over 12 years taken the Australian hacker from the Ecuadorean embassy to Belmarsh prison.

When they were first brought, the US charges against Assange "sparked outrage among his many global supporters", Reuters reported.

Many press freedom advocates have long argued that "criminally charging Assange represents a threat to free speech".

In the eyes of federal prosecutors, however, Assange's activities "went way beyond that of a journalist gathering information, amounting to an attempt to solicit, steal and indiscriminately publish classified government documents", said the AP.

Diplomatic efforts on the part of the Australian government are likely to have played a part in the timing of the deal. The Albanese administration has been "privately lobbying Washington to find a solution to Assange’s case since it was elected in 2022", said the Financial Times.

After the court hearing tomorrow, Assange is expected to continue onwards to Canberra, where his wife Stella and their two children, aged seven and five, are waiting for him.

She told the PA media agency that brokering the deal had been "touch and go" at times and that the full terms of the agreement, which she described as "very interesting" would be made public after the hearing.

While the development is undoubtedly positive for Assange himself and for the Albanese government "the legacy of the fight over Assange is murkier", said Bloomberg. US prosecutors' dogged pursuit of the whistleblower for almost 15 years has "likely had a chilling effect on others tempted to expose government wrongdoing" at a time when "advancing technologies such as AI make the need for effective public restraint of state power more urgent than ever".