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Why the hearing to free Julian Assange happened on a tiny island in the middle of the Pacific
Julian Assange’s long-running legal odyssey has moved around the world, involving high-level negotiations across Australia, the United States, Sweden, the United Kingdom and Ecuador.
And now, more than 14 years after WikiLeaks dropped a cache of classified US defence documents alleging war crimes in Afghanistan and Syria, his case has reached a courtroom on a small island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
The Northern Mariana Islands is a US territory and one of the closest to mainland Australia. It shares a time zone with Australia’s east coast.
Assange arrived on the island of Saipan about 6:30am, accompanied by Australia’s ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd.
Just over an hour later, he walked into the US District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands, where he entered a guilty plea as part of a deal with the US Department of Justice (DOJ) that brought his fight for freedom to a close.
The terms of the deal meant Assange was sentenced to time served, meaning at the close of proceedings, he was free to travel to Australia.
After seven years in the Ecuadorian embassy and five years in Belmarsh Prison, Assange now returning to Australia.
And like his legal battle has done plenty of times before, it brought another dramatic twist — one that has taken him from a high-security jail cell in England to the big blue of the Pacific.
Why the Northern Mariana Islands?
If you needed to be in an United States District Court, far from continental USA and close to home in Australia, the Northern Mariana Islands are a good option.
Saipan is the largest island and the capital of the territory, which begins roughly 70 kilometres north of Guam and stretches across 14 islands.
Like Guam or Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands are part of the US without the full status of a state.
After time as a colony of Spain, Germany and then Japan, the United States took control of the island in World War II after the Battle of Saipan in 1944; residents voted to become a US territory in 1975.
Residents are US citizens, but cannot vote in presidential elections.
Crucially, some of the islands, like Saipan, also host US district courts.
As the court hearing started, Judge Ramona Manglona who is presiding over the case said: “Not many people recognise we are part of the United States, but that is true.”
On Tuesday, WikiLeaks posted on the social media platform X a video showing Australia’s High Commissioner to the UK, Stephen Smith, in a vehicle with Assange.
It said the pair were in Bangkok. Assange’s jet arrived in the Thai capital earlier in the day and took off again, bound for Saipan, just after 10:30pm local time (1:30am Wednesday, AEST).
When Assange was in court on Wednesday, he was roughly 3,000km from Australia. Hawaii is more than twice as far away, California further still.
US prosecutors said the location was important to Assange and that he wanted to go to a court close to Australia.
In a letter filed to the US court on Saipan, a Department of Justice official thanks the court for accommodating the matter “at the joint request of both of the parties”.
The letter notes “the defendant’s opposition to travelling to the continental United States to enter his guilty plea and the proximity of this federal US District Court to the defendant’s country of citizenship, Australia”.
Assange and his legal team have long believed it would not be safe for him to enter the United States, but under the terms of the plea deal, it appears a compromise was found.
“He has to front up to charges that have been brought under US law,” professor at the University of Sydney’s law school Emily Crawford told Reuters.
“It had to be US territory, but it had to be the US territory closest to Australia that wasn’t a US state like Hawaii.”
Inside the courtroom
Assange’s case started at 9am when he entered the court room wearing a black suit.
Sat behind him were Mr Rudd, Mr Smith, and human rights lawyer Jennifer Robinson.
All stood up as Judge Manglona entered the court room.
The judge then told the court the charge was “conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defense information,” which carries a maximum penalty of up to 10-years in prison.
Assange was then asked to enter his plea to the specific charge, to which he said “guilty“.
However, in a last act of defiance against the US legal system, he said there were caveats to his guilt.
The judge then said she accepted the plea.
In an interview with the BBC on Tuesday, Assange’s wife Stella said there was an agreement “in principle” with the US Department of Justice but the judge must have signed off on it before it became official.
“Once the judge signs off on it, then it is formally real,” she said.
Judge Manglona has been serving as the court’s chief judge since her nomination in 2011 by then US president Barack Obama after eight years as an associate judge.
The Saipan native was a trailblazer in the US federal legal system where among other achievements she was the first Indigenous woman to pass the local bar exam and the first and only woman to serve on this court.
Ms Assange said all the details of deal they made with the US would be “made public, and I think it’s a very interesting deal”.
“The important thing here is that the deal involved time served — that if he signed it, he would be able to walk free,” she told the BBC.
Under the deal he will be sentenced to 62 months of time that he has already served.
Assange left the island after the hearing and made his way back to Australia.
A surprise stop at island court
Until yesterday, the next date on the calendar for Assange’s legal matters was in early July when a UK court was due to hear his appeal against his extradition to the US.
The Australian government has long been pushing the US to resolve the case and recently US President Joe Biden said “we’re considering it” when asked if he had a response to Canberra’s request that he end Assange’s prosecution.
So there was some pressure and indication a deal might be possible, but little clue it would involve a trip to the Northern Mariana Islands.
As news of the plea deal broke, pre-prepared videos from Ms Assange and WikiLeaks editor Kristinn Hrafnsson were released.
In one, Mr Hrafnsson said: “If you’re seeing this, that means he’s out.”
Meanwhile, the High Court in London on Tuesday sealed an order that revealed a “plea agreement” was signed between Assange and the US government on June 19.
While Assange has left the United Kingdom, he was due in court next month for an appeal hearing, and the proceedings still need to be formally terminated.
The order said conditional bail was approved to allow Assange to travel to Saipan to attend Wednesday’s court hearing.
Assange was charged with 18 criminal offences in the US, including obtaining, receiving and disclosing classified information.
American officials declined to publicly discuss the plea deal before the hearing.
“While the matter is pending, it’s important for me not to comment on it at all,” US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said. “Maybe tomorrow, we’ll have more to say.”
But the order released by the High Court in London says the agreement is for Assange to plead guilty to one of the 18 charges, with a “proposed sentence of time served”.
It says it is “anticipated that a plea will be entered on Wednesday” and that after it is, “the United States have undertaken to withdraw the extradition request”.
Following the conclusion of the court proceedings the DOJ released a lengthy statement revealing under the plea agreement Assange was prohibited from returning to the US without permission.
ABC/Reuters
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