Anthony Albanese said he had communicated “directly” with Julian Assange’s lawyers.
Canberra:
Australia’s prime minister said Wednesday that a series of recent, undisclosed missions to the United States helped forge the plea deal that freed Julian Assange.
The 52-year-old WikiLeaks founder landed in Canberra hours earlier, having earned his freedom by pleading guilty to a single conspiracy to obtain and disseminate US national defense information.
He was sentenced by a court in the U.S. Pacific territory of the Northern Mariana Islands to serve five years and two months in prison, which he had already spent in London’s high-security Belmarsh prison, and to walk free.
The US Department of Justice had to make a “series of decisions” to allow the plea deal to proceed, Anthony Albanese told a news conference in Canberra, stressing that the US department was independent and “not subject to political influence”.
A “whole group of people” had visited the United States as the deal was being hammered out, the Australian leader told reporters.
“I’m surprised that some of it was missed by the people in this room — some of the visits — but it’s not for me to indicate that,” Albanese said.
He advised journalists to “go back and look at some diaries and look at who has traveled to the United States in recent months.”
Albanese said he had interacted “directly” with Assange’s lawyers during the negotiations.
Australian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom Stephen Smith also acted as a communications channel by visiting Assange in Belmarsh, the prime minister said.
“The details of the plea deal were worked out over time,” he said.
“This was the only way I could see a resolution being reached – and the goal here was to bring these matters to a close.”
Albanese said he had never met Assange but spoke to him the moment his plane landed in Canberra as part of a mutually agreed plan.
“I had a very cordial conversation with him this evening. He was very generous in his praise for the efforts of the Australian government,” he added.
“The Australian government stands up for Australian citizens. That’s what we do.”
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