WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange arrived in Canberra on Wednesday (26.6.2024) on charter flight VJT199, which landed around 7:40 p.m. local time at Canberra International Airport, after about seven hours of flight. “After almost 14 years of arbitrary detention in the United Kingdom, and 5 years in a maximum security prison for his innovative work, Julian Assange has returned home to Australia,” WikiLeaks highlights in its X account.
Assange was picked up at the airport by his wife, Stella Assange, and their two children. He had planned to hold a press conference at a hotel in the Australian capital, but in the end it was Stella Assange who appeared before the media to explain that her husband “needs time and recovery” to “get used to freedom.”
The wife of the WikiLeaks founder asked for “space and privacy” before she decides to “speak again”, following her return to Australia as a free man. “Julian wanted to be here today, but he asked me to do it… They have to understand what he has been through. He needs time, he needs to recover and this is a process…” said Stella Assange.
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Around a hundred journalists were waiting at Canberra airport to document Assange’s return to his native Australia after a long trip since he left London, which led him to make a technical stop in Bangkok on Tuesday, before flying to the Northern Mariana Islands (US territory in the Pacific) to formalize their freedom today. MS (afp/efe)
