- President Joe Biden said Wednesday he is “considering” ending the prosecution of Julian Assange.
- In February, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese made the request and said he wanted Assange returned to his native Australia.
- Biden was asked about Assange as he hosted another Quad leader, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, for a state visit to the White House.
President Joe Biden said Wednesday he is considering ending the prosecution of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange.
In February, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called for the years-long prosecution of Assange to end and for him to be returned to his native Australia.
Biden receives another Quad member, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, at the White House on Wednesday for an official state visit.
“We’re thinking about it,” Biden told reporters when asked about Assange as he walked with Kishida along the White House colonnade after Wednesday’s welcoming ceremony on the South Lawn.
Assange is in custody in the United Kingdom.
President Joe Biden (R) said he was “considering” ending the prosecution of Julian Assange at Australia’s request. He responded to a question about it while accompanying Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida (left) into the Oval Office on Wednesday.
In February, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (left) called on the United States to drop charges against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange (right) and return him to his native Australia. He is currently in prison in the United Kingdom
Assange faces espionage charges in the United States after his 2010 release of classified U.S. military intelligence documents, including footage of U.S. airstrikes in Baghdad, diplomatic cables and classified communications about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Video showed a US military helicopter killing civilians in Baghdad, including two Reuters journalists, mistaking camera equipment for weapons.
Wikileaks received the information from Chelsea Manning, a former US military intelligence officer, who was initially sentenced to 35 years in prison but was released in 2017 when President Barack Obama commuted her sentence.
Biden, then vice president, called Assange a “high-tech terrorist” in a December 2010 interview with Meet the Press.
Assange was first arrested in London in 2010 while wanted for questioning by the Swedes, accused by two women of rape and sexual assault.
In 2012, he was granted a political amnesty at the Ecuadorian embassy in London and remained there – essentially imprisoned in the house – until 2019, after the Ecuadorians revoked his amnesty.
At that point, members of the London Metropolitan Police entered the residence and arrested Assange.
He was charged with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion related to his involvement with Manning, a 2018 charge that was previously unsealed.
The Justice Department added 17 espionage charges to the case in May 2018.
The charges carried a maximum sentence of 170 years in prison.
And in June 2020, a grand jury expanded Assange’s indictment, alleging that he recruited and conspired with hackers to obtain information for Wikileaks.
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