Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has left court a free man and will soon return home to Australia as his years-long legal pursuit comes to an end.
For the past 14 years, Assange has sought to evade US authorities attempting to bring him to American soil on spying charges after he leaked troves of secret state information.
He spent almost seven years holed up in Ecuador’s London embassy before being detained at a maximum security prison in the UK where he fought his extradition.
But on Wednesday Assange, joined by Australia’s ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd, finally faced a United States territory court in Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands.
Assange, 52, pleaded guilty to a single criminal count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified US national defence documents and was sentenced to 62 months – which he has already served.
A few hours later, he left court for what could be the last time, jostled as he worked his way through the crowd.
He made no comment, as he seemed to nod his head in acknowledgement of the assembled media.
His lawyer Jennifer Robinson thanked the Australian government and the global movement for the court outcome.
“It is a huge relief to his family, to his friends, to his supporters and to us and to everyone who believes in free speech around the world that he can now return home to Australia and be reunited with his family,” she told reporters outside court.
“I hope that the fact that we’ve been able to free Julian Assange today against all the odds and against one of the most powerful governments in the world will give hope to all journalists and publishers who are imprisoned, around the world.”
Assange has boarded a chartered flight and is expected to make a public statement when he arrives in Canberra on Wednesday evening.
For his supporters, it was a moment of jubilation.
“It’s a great victory for freedom of expression and also justice,” Australian Assange Campaign legal adviser Greg Barns SC told AAP.
“Julian faced the prospect of over 170 years in a US jail if he’d been convicted of the charges for which the Americans were seeking to extradite him.”
But Alexander Downer, the former Australian high commissioner to the UK who served while Assange was seeking asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy, said he doubted Australians would have sympathy for him.
“What he did was a criminal offence, and it was a terrible thing to do, morally as well, and endangering people’s lives in that way,” he told the BBC.
Australia had long called for the US to end its pursuit of Assange.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had directly raised the issue with US President Joe Biden, and in September, politicians from across Australia’s political spectrum converged on Washington to lobby US decision-makers.
“His case has dragged on for too long, there is nothing to be gained from his continued incarceration, and we want him brought home to Australia,” Mr Albanese told reporters on Wednesday.
Opposition finance spokeswoman Jane Hume said Mr Assange was “no hero” of hers, but welcomed his return.
“We’re very pleased to see him returned to Australia, but I don’t think that hero worship is an appropriate response,” she said.
Assange’s family are relieved at his release, with his father John Shipton praising the Australian government for its efforts to end his son’s pursuit.
“Having Julian home, to an ordinary life, after 15 years of incarceration in one form or another – house arrest, jail and asylum in an embassy – is pretty good news,” he told the ABC.
On Tuesday night his wife Stella Assange made a public call for donations to pay the $US520,000 ($A780,000) fee for the jet bringing her husband home.
Assange was “obligated” to pay the money to the Australian government, she said in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
