WikiLeaks said that on June 24, the founder left a high-security prison in Britain, where he spent 1,901 days.
Points of attention
- Julian Assange founded the WikiLeaks website, which hosted confidential material.
- After being released from prison in Britain, according to an agreement with the investigation, he can avoid imprisonment in the United States.
- Judges in Britain are considering the case of Assange's extradition to the United States.
- Assange faces up to 175 years in prison on charges of espionage and computer misuse.
- After more than five years in prison, Assange can return to his family, whom he only saw behind bars.
Assange pleaded guilty and was released from a British prison
The founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, who is accused by the United States of disclosing classified information, made a deal with the investigation and pleaded guilty - he was released from prison in Britain, where he was awaiting extradition. This was reported by CNN and also confirmed by WikiLeaks.
According to the publication, this agreement will allow Assange to avoid imprisonment in the United States. Although prosecutors will now seek to jail him for 62 months, this term will include the 62 months Assange served in London's maximum security prison.
After Assange appears in US federal court in the Northern Mariana Islands in the western Pacific Ocean and pleads guilty, he will be able to return to Australia.
WikiLeaks said that on June 24, the founder left a high-security prison in Britain, where he spent 1,901 days. After that, he boarded the plane at Stansted Airport.
After more than five years in a 2x3 meter cell, isolated 23 hours a day, he will soon be reunited with his wife Stella Assange and their children, who knew their father only from behind bars, the company wrote.
WikiLeaks added that Assange's release is the result of a global campaign that reached leaders "all the way to the United Nations."
What is known about the Assange case
Assange is an Australian journalist who founded the WikiLeaks website in 2006, which posted classified materials on corruption, espionage, war crimes, diplomacy, etc.
Since 2012, Assange has spent seven years holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he has been accused of rape and sexual harassment, which he denies. In November 2019, Sweden closed the investigation against Assange. In April 2019, Assange was arrested at the London embassy of Ecuador.
US prosecutors charged Assange with 17 counts of espionage and one count of computer misuse in connection with WikiLeaks' publication of thousands of military and diplomatic documents. Assange's lawyers claim that he faces up to 175 years in prison in the United States. The US government said the possible sentence would most likely be between four and six years.
On December 10, 2021, the Court of Appeal of England and Wales returned the case of Julian Assange's extradition to the United States to the court of first instance.
