Julian Assange has landed in Australia, bringing to an abrupt end a bitter and protracted legal saga lasting more than a decade that centred on the release of hundreds of thousands of classified and unfiltered US state department documents.
Touching down at Canberra airport on Wednesday evening at 7.30pm local time, Mr Assange, who travelled to his home country via a crowd-funded private jet marked VJT199, was greeted by a throng of waiting media and a small group of supporters.
The WikiLeak’s founder on Monday entered a plea deal with US prosecutors after attempt to evade extradition to the United States for more than a decade over allegations
Having left the United Kingdom’s Belmarsh Prison on Monday after he was granted bail by the UK High Court, Mr Assange immediately boarded a private jet at Stansted Airport.
The 52-year-old then flew to Saipan, a self-governing US territory located in the western Pacific, about 2400km east of the Philippines, where he fronted a US Federal Court on Wednesday morning.
There he plead guilty to a single felony of conspiring to unlawfully obtain and disseminate classified information, a violation under the US Espionage Act, an agreement that spared him further time in imprisonment.
Just before 7pm local time, WikiLeaks shared a photo to X, formerly Twitter, showing Mr Assange on the phone with his wife Stella, who is at the airport awaiting his arrival.
“One hour to touchdown in Canberra #FreedomFlight,” the caption read.
Speaking on Wednesday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, whose government had engaged in significant diplomatic efforts to secure Mr Assange’s freedom, welcomed his expected return.
“Regardless of your views about his activities and they will be varied, Mr Assange’s case has dragged on for too long,” Mr Albanese told the parliament.
“I am pleased that he is on his way home to Australia to reunite with his family here.”
The prime minister on repeated occasions raised Mr Assange’s case with UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and US president Joe Biden, while Australia’s top diplomats in the UK and the US, former defence minister Stephen Smith and former prime minister Kevin Rudd, also intensely lobbied for his freedom.
Mr Assange’s legal woes commenced in 2010 after WikiLeaks released thousands of classified US military documents and diplomatic cables which covered the United State’s actions in Iraq and Afghanistan in the early 2000s which were obtained by US Army analyst Chelsea Manning.
Collaborating with media outlets, Mr Assange shot to international prominence and was celebrated as an advocate of radical government transparency among proponents of press freedom who argued he acted to reveal military wrongdoing.
But DOJ prosecutors, who argued the actions risked the country’s national security, subsequently charged Mr Assange over the leaks, alleging he had violated the Espionage Act, accusing him of conspiring with Ms Manning by assisting her to break into a Defence Department computer.
The documents released included the un-redacted names of individuals who were placed at “grave and imminent risk”, including Iraqi informants, DOJ prosecutors claimed.
Lawyers for Mr Assange argued that he had merely distributed the classified documents rather than actively sought to obtain them, a protection afforded to journalists under the US’ First Amendment of free speech.
Mr Assange has spent more than a decade in an at times bizarre attempt to evade extradition to the United States where he faced trial.
Initially pursue in 2010 by Swedish authorities who sought his arrest on rape allegations that he denied and were later dropped, Mr Assange initially cooperated with British police regarding the matter but later accused the charges as a pretext for his extradition.
After exhausting his legal options, Mr Assange sought refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London where he was unable to leave as he would face arrest by British police.
There he conceived his two children with wife Stella Assange, and hosted celebrities including Pamela Anderson and Lady Gaga.
But after seven years Mr Assange ultimately outstayed his welcome, angering embassy officials by skateboarding in the hallways, not cleaning up his cat’s mess, and refusing to pay for internet use and laundry facilities.
He was subsequently arrested by British police and charged with breaching his bail conditions, leaving him imprisoned in a high security prison for five years.
While a UK court initially ruled in favour of Mr Assange’s request not be extradited to the US, that ruling was successfully appealed by the DOJ.
Earlier this year, a London court granted Mr Assange a right to appeal the extradition order, further extending the long running legal fight.