Julian Assange, the infamous founder of whistleblower media group WikiLeaks, made a shocking revelation to European lawmakers on Tuesday. He confessed that his guilty plea to US espionage accusations was a necessary sacrifice, as legal and political efforts to protect his freedom had proven futile.
“I eventually chose freedom over an unrealizable justice,” Assange declared in his first public comments since being released from prison. The 53-year-old returned to his home country of Australia in June after striking a deal that required him to plead guilty to violating US espionage laws, thereby ending a tumultuous 14-year legal battle in Britain.
Speaking before the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights at the Council of Europe, Assange made a bold statement, proclaiming, “I am free today after years of incarceration because I stood up for journalism, sought the truth from sources, and informed the public.”
A report by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe labeled Assange as a political prisoner and urged Britain to conduct an inquiry into allegations of inhuman treatment towards him. Dressed in a black suit with a burgundy tie, Assange sat alongside his wife Stella and WikiLeaks’ editor Kristinn Hrafnsson, delivering his remarks from handwritten notes.
“I am still recovering from the trauma I have endured,” Assange admitted, acknowledging the toll that isolation had taken on him. His wife, whom he married while in a London jail, emphasized that he needed time to regain his health and sanity after his extended incarceration, especially to reconnect with their two children who he had only seen in a prison setting.
WikiLeaks garnered international attention for its controversial leaks of classified U.S. military documents and videos from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars in the early 2000s. These disclosures highlighted issues such as prisoner abuse, human rights violations, and civilian casualties, drawing condemnation from US authorities who claimed the leaks jeopardized national security and endangered lives.