Saipan: the remote Pacific island that hosted Julian Assange

Usually associated with "sun, sand and snorkelling" the Pacific island of Saipan was a surprising location for the culmination of Julian Assange's long legal battle with the USA.

But the "string of tiny dots in the Pacific Ocean" that make up the Northern Mariana Islands have this week been at the centre of a "geopolitical chessboard", said the BBC. 

After agreeing a surprise plea deal, Assange made clear he would only face "a court close to his home of Australia but not on the continental United States", Reuters reported. Saipan fits the bill, being the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands, a "commonwealth of the United States" captured during World War Two, said SBS News Australia.

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Assange can 'walk free'

Julian Assange was considered to be "one of Australia's most accomplished hackers" in the 1990s, said The Guardian. He rose to prominence after establishing WikiLeaks, which "published leaked material", including confidential reports.

For 14 years, Assange has fought calls to "bring him to the US for prosecution" after he was accused of a conspiracy to break into United States military databases "to acquire sensitive information", said the BBC. He has consistently argued his actions were in the public interest.

Assange has spent the last five years in Belmarsh prison, London, and while it is "unclear why he has been released now", a bargain has been struck, said The Guardian. This deal saw Assange plead guilty to one espionage charge, allowing him to "walk free" due to previous time served. 

Geopolitical importance

Perhaps serendipitously, the end of Assange's legal fight falls at a time when the "echoes of history" are particularly loud for this remote island, said The Sydney Morning Herald.

This week, the island marked 80 years of peace since the "bloody" Battle of Saipan during World War Two that "claimed the lives of 3,000 American soldiers and many, many more Japanese casualties", the newspaper added.

Directly referencing the conflict, US District Court Judge Ramona Manglona told Assange: "We've been celebrating a peace here with a former enemy. And now there's some peace that you need to restore yourself when you walk out and pursue your life as a free man".

The Northern Mariana Islands may continue to play an important, albeit relatively silent role in geopolitics.

The archipelago is "popular with Korean and Chinese tourists" because it is the "only part of the United States that Chinese citizens can enter without a visa, said Reuters.

However, this "has been a point of contention" for lawmakers in the US who have national security concerns, added the BBC, and who have urged authorities to "impose a visa requirement for Chinese visitors to the islands".

Ultimately, the islands continue to be "under the threat of China's economic subversion", said The Diplomat in 2021, and thus Washington has stressed their strategic importance.