WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to take plea deal that may secure prison release: report

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is reportedly set to plead guilty to U.S. charges in a deal that could lead to his release from British prison.

According to NBC News, "Assange was charged by criminal information — which typically signifies a plea deal — with conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defense information, the court documents say. U.S. charges against Assange stem from one of the largest publications of classified information in American history, which took place during the first term of Barack Obama's presidency."

"Starting in late 2009, according to the government, Assange conspired with Chelsea Manning, a military intelligence analyst, to disclose tens of thousands of activity reports about the war in Afghanistan, hundreds of thousands of reports about the war in Iraq, hundreds of thousands of State Department cables and assessment briefs of Guantanamo Bay detainees using his WikiLeaks website," the report noted.

Assange, who has served five years in British prison awaiting extradition to the U.S. after he had spent several years prior holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid arrest, was also separately wanted as part of a rape investigation in Sweden for years, but that case was dropped in 2019, as Swedish prosecutors believed that the evidence was too stale to secure a conviction.

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Supporters of Assange argue he has fought to hold governments accountable; his detractors often argue his leaks were not journalism, but a rogue private intelligence operation calculated to help Russia, as demonstrated by accusations that the Belarusian dictatorship, a key ally of Moscow, used WikiLeaks information to target dissidents.

"Assange has been fighting extradition to the U.S. for more than a decade," noted the report. "In March, the High Court in London gave him permission for a full hearing on his appeal as he sought assurances that he could rely upon the First Amendment at a trial in the United States. In May, two judges on the High Court said he could have a full hearing on whether he would be discriminated against in the U.S. because he is a foreign national. A hearing on the issue of Assange's free speech rights had been scheduled for July 9-10."