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Tuesday, June 25, 2024

Julian Assange is free

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is free and has made a plea deal with the U.S. government that will put an end to his 12-year legal ordeal. 

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to plead guilty to espionage charge as part of deal with U.S. | CBC News | Associated Press:

June 24, 2024 - "A plane carrying Julian Assange took off from Bangkok on Tuesday after refuelling, as the WikiLeaks founder was on his way to enter a plea deal with the U.S. government that will free him and resolve the legal case that spanned years and continents over the publication of a trove of classified documents. Chartered flight VJT199 from London's Stansted Airport landed after noon at Bangkok's Don Mueang International Airport.... Airport officials told The Associated Press earlier the plane would then depart for the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. commonwealth in the Western Pacific, where Assange is to appear in court Wednesday morning local time.

"Assange is expected to plead guilty to an Espionage Act charge of conspiring to unlawfully obtain and disseminate classified national defence information, according to the U.S. Justice Department in a letter filed in court. Stella Assange told the BBC from Australia that ... details of the agreement would be made public once the judge had signed off on it.'He will be a free man once it is signed off by a judge,' she said.... 

"The deal ensures that Assange will admit guilt while also sparing him from any additional prison time. He had spent years hiding out in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, after Swedish authorities sought his arrest on rape allegations. Assange denied those charges, and whle Sweden eventually dropped its sex crimes investigation because so much time had elapsed, he had remained in London's high-security Belmarsh Prison during the extradition battle with the U.S."

Read more: https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/wikileaks-julian-assange-classified-documents-espionage-charge-1.7245342

Plea deal: Julian Assange makes his way to US court and later freedom | We Are Iowa Local 5 News | June 25, 2024:

Julian Assange, a Free Man | Reason | Liz Wolfe: 

June 25, 2024 - "Assange, who has been at risk of being extradited to the U.S. and prosecuted under the Espionage Act for publishing documents — an activity protected by the First Amendment — that the government says contain classified national security information, will plead guilty to a single felony count and return to his native Australia. Prior to reaching this deal with the U.S. Department of Justice, Assange could have faced up to 170 years in prison if extradited to America.

"From 2012 to 2019, Assange had been living at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, caught in legal limbo and fearing extradition by British authorities. In 2019, Ecuador's president was angered by allegations of corruption made public via WikiLeaks and pulled Assange's asylum protections. The British authorities rounded Assange up and put him in Belmarsh....

"In 2010, WikiLeaks published a video called 'Collateral Murder,' which showed a 2007 U.S. airstrike in Baghdad in which several civilians, including two Reuters journalists, were killed. The organization, which received leaks from various government and military personnel, including the now-famous whistleblower Chelsea Manning, received retribution from the U.S. government for publicizing possible violations of military rules of engagement and showing the extreme brutality of war, including the massive civilian death toll in Iraq at the hands of the U.S. Army. For more than a decade, Assange was not treated like a journalist, but like a criminal. Now, his ordeal will finally come to a close."

Read more: https://reason.com/2024/06/25/julian-assange-a-free-man/ 

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