Julian Assange is finally free, returning to Australia in June after accepting a plea deal following five years in London’s Belmarsh prison. The US demanded he plead guilty to “conspiracy to obtain and disclose defence information” under the Espionage Act, sentencing him to time already served.
This is a victory against the supporters of imperialism who wanted him imprisoned for life. He was facing up to 175 years in prison in the US.
The US wanted revenge over Assange’s role in the release by WikiLeaks of hundreds of thousands of military documents and diplomatic cables exposing US war crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq, leaked by former US army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning.
They included the shocking “Collateral Murder” video that exposed the killing of a group of innocent civilians, including two Reuters journalists, from a US helicopter in Iraq in 2007.
Anthony Albanese celebrated Assange’s release, and Assange’s family have praised him for helping secure his freedom. But Albanese is complicit in Israel’s genocide and is spending billions on a military buildup as part of the US march to war against China, supporting the sickening imperialism Assange revealed.
And Albanese is also backing laws that protect evidence of Australian war crimes in overseas imperialist adventures from going public. These have seen former military lawyer David McBride sentenced to five years and eight months in prison for a similar act exposing military secrets. McBride leaked material to the ABC that formed the basis of The Afghan Files, revealing brutal unlawful killings by SAS soldiers in Afghanistan.
In January the government quietly dropped its election promise to hold an inquiry into the prosecution of Witness K and his lawyer Bernard Collaery, over their role in the release of evidence of an Australian spying operation on East Timor during Timor Sea oil and gas negotiations in 2004.
Tax office whistleblower Richard Boyle is also facing trial in September over his actions in gathering documents to prove his claims, later upheld, of abuses of power by tax debt collectors.
WikiLeaks said Assange’s freedom was the, “result of a global campaign that spanned grassroots organisers, press freedom campaigners, legislators and leaders”.
It is a product of years of campaigning and pressure for his release—and it shows that it’s possible to stand up to US imperialism and win.
By James Supple
