Assange lands in Australia after plea

CANBERRA — WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange landed in Australia on Wednesday to an ecstatic welcome after pleading guilty to violating US espionage law in a deal that set him free from a decadelong legal battle.

Assange disembarked from a private jet at Canberra Airport just after 7:30 pm and waved to waiting media.

His arrival ends a decadelong legal saga in which Assange spent more than five years in the British high-security Belmarsh Prison and seven years in asylum at the Ecuadorian embassy in London battling extradition to Sweden on sexual assault allegations and to the United States, where he faced 18 criminal charges.

Assange was embroiled in a lengthy legal battle with the US government due to his role in acquiring and releasing classified military and diplomatic documents between 2009 and 2011.These files included hundreds of thousands of secret US military documents related to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

During a three-hour hearing in the US territory of Saipan, Assange pleaded guilty to one criminal count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified national defense documents, but said he had believed the US Constitution's First Amendment, which protects free speech, shielded his activities.

"Working as a journalist, I encouraged my source to provide information that was said to be classified in order to publish that information," he told the court.

"I believed the First Amendment protected that activity, but I accept that it was … a violation of the espionage statute."

Chief US District Judge Ramona V. Manglona accepted his guilty plea.

The US Justice Department agreed to conduct the hearing on the remote island, a US commonwealth in the Pacific, because Assange did not want to come to continental US.

His supporters viewed him as a brave journalist and whistleblower exposing government wrongdoing, while his critics share grave concerns about the potential harm caused by his leaks.

The deal with the US Justice Department concludes his 12-year legal ordeal. The Joe Biden administration's compromise to reach a deal with Assange came amid mounting pressure from the United Nations and allies such as Australia and Germany, all urging the US to drop the extradition and resolve the case promptly.

In February, the Australian Parliament passed a motion calling for Assange to be allowed to return to his home country. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he hoped for an amicable end to the prosecution.

Agencies - Xinhua