espionage
Julian Assange released from prison after agreeing to plea deal with US government

Julian Assange, Embassy Of Ecuador on May 19, 2017, in London, England
From LifeSiteNews
Following a 5-year solitary incarceration, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was released from a London prison after taking a plea deal with the U.S. Department of Justice regarding the publication of classified information online.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been released from prison after agreeing to a plea deal with the U.S. Justice Department.
On Monday, the high-profile journalist was released from prison after agreeing to a deal in which he plead guilty for his involvement in publishing classified information received from a whistleblower working inside the U.S. government.
As CNN reported, Assange will receive a 62-month prison sentence according to the terms of the agreements. The sentence equals the time he spent in the high-security prison Belmarsh near London. The time served will be credited toward his sentence, allowing Assange to leave prison immediately and return to his native Australia.
“Julian Assange is free,” WikiLeaks announced in its statement posted on X, formerly Twitter. “He left Belmarsh maximum security prison on the morning of 24 June, after having spent 1901 days there. He was granted bail by the High Court in London and was released at Stansted airport during the afternoon, where he boarded a plane and departed the UK.”
JULIAN ASSANGE IS FREE
Julian Assange is free. He left Belmarsh maximum security prison on the morning of 24 June, after having spent 1901 days there. He was granted bail by the High Court in London and was released at Stansted airport during the afternoon, where he boarded a…
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) June 24, 2024
“This is the result of a global campaign that spanned grass-roots organizers, press freedom campaigners, legislators and leaders from across the political spectrum, all the way to the United Nations. This created the space for a long period of negotiations with the US Department of Justice, leading to a deal that has not yet been formally finalized. We will provide more information as soon as possible.”
“After more than five years in a 2×3 metre cell, isolated 23 hours a day, he will soon reunite with his wife Stella Assange, and their children, who have only known their father from behind bars,” the statement continued, adding that “WikiLeaks published groundbreaking stories of government corruption and human rights abuses, holding the powerful accountable for their actions. As editor-in-chief, Julian paid severely for these principles, and for the people’s right to know.”
Assange is expected to officially plead guilty in a court in the Northern Mariana Islands on Wednesday, a U.S. territory located in the Pacific Ocean relatively close to Assange’s native Australia.
Assange faced life in prison in the U.S. for 17 counts of espionage and one charge of computer misuse related to the publication of millions of classified documents by WikiLeaks.
Assange’s legal battle began in 2010 when WikiLeaks published classified documents regarding the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, including a video that showed a U.S. military helicopter killing several civilians, including two Reuters journalists, in Baghdad, Iraq. The information was provided by former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning. From 2012 to 2019, Assange lived in the Ecuadorian embassy in London under asylum status. After he was arrested by Metropolitan police in 2019 under an extradition warrant from the U.S. government, Assange was imprisoned at Belmarsh, a high-security prison close to London, where he has been held in solitary confinement up until Monday.
According to sources cited by CNN, officials at the Justice Department and the FBI opposed any deal that did not include a guilty plea to a felony by Assange.
Journalist Glenn Greenwald warned of the danger of Assange pleading guilty to a felony for publishing classified information, which, in the eyes of many, was not a crime but a service to society, namely providing information showing that governments are deceiving their citizens.
“I never believed that the Biden administration actually wanted to bring Julian Assange onto American soil to stand trial,” Greenwald said. “Imagine the spectacle that it would have created as Biden heads into an election.”
It would put on Joe Biden’s record that he would be the first American president in history to preside over the imprisonment, not of a source who leaked information, but of someone who published classified information, which every newspaper in the United States does on a regular basis…
The goal of… keeping him in prison was to crush Julian Assange physically and mentally, and they succeeded in doing that…
They wanted to break Assange and simultaneously send a message to any future Assanges that ‘We will ruin your life if you publish our secrets.’
Drawing parallels to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden not being allowed to return to the U.S., Greenwald said, “It is a deterrent message to keep the ability to hide their own crimes through secrecy, immune from the one vulnerability that they have which is that brave people inside the government leak that information to the public or through the media and reveal what it is they are doing.”
2025 Federal Election
Hong Kong-Canadian Groups Demand PM Carney Drop Liberal Candidate Over “Bounty” Remark Supporting CCP Repression

Sam Cooper
Thirteen Hong Kong-Canadian organizations are calling on Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Liberal Party to immediately revoke the candidacy of MP Paul Chiang, alleging he “may have violated Canadian laws” after making explosive remarks that appeared to endorse a Chinese Communist Party bounty targeting a Toronto-area Conservative candidate.
The controversy centers on Chiang’s comments during a January meeting with Chinese-language media in Toronto, where the Markham–Unionville Liberal incumbent said, “If you can take him to the Chinese Consulate General in Toronto, you can get the million-dollar reward,” referring to Joe Tay, the Conservative candidate in Don Valley North who is wanted by Hong Kong authorities for running a pro-democracy YouTube channel in Canada.
The response from Mark Carney’s Liberals appears increasingly conflicted, especially in light of remarks made last year by the party’s top foreign affairs official concerning Chinese transnational repression targeting Hong Kong immigrants in Canada.
Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly issued a warning in December, stating: “This attempt by Hong Kong authorities to conduct transnational repression abroad, including by issuing threats, intimidation or coercion against Canadians or those in Canada, will not be tolerated.”
Tay had remained silent since the revelations broke Friday. But on Sunday evening, he made his first public statement in a post on X.
“This is the most challenging time in our lifetime, and we must give it everything we’ve got to protect this place we call home. A fourth term for the Liberals is not an option,” Tay wrote.
About the same time, Paul Chiang posted his own statement on social media, offering a direct apology to Tay.
“Today, I spoke with Joseph Tay, the Conservative candidate for Don Valley North, to personally apologize for the comments that I made this past January. It was a terrible lapse of judgement. I recognize the severity of the statement and I am deeply disappointed in myself. As a 28-year police veteran, I have always strived to treat people with respect and dignity. In this case, I failed to meet that standard. I know better and it will never happen again.”
Despite the apology, a Carney campaign spokesperson told reporters Sunday that the party would not remove Chiang from the ballot.
Now, leading Hong Kong Canadian advocacy groups are intensifying pressure, saying Chiang’s comments amount to a tacit endorsement of Beijing’s foreign repression network — a growing concern for Canadian authorities, especially after Ottawa’s diplomatic expulsion of a Chinese official last year over threats to MP Michael Chong’s family.
“The integrity of Canada’s democratic elections has been damaged,” the groups wrote in a joint statement. “Paul Chiang’s actions may have violated Canadian laws, including the Foreign Interference and Security of Information Act and the Canada Elections Act.”
Meanwhile, as the chorus of political condemnation grew beyond criticism from Conservative Party leaders, NDP MP Jenny Kwan — herself a victim of targeted Chinese interference, according to testimony at the Hogue Commission — stood with NDP leader Jagmeet Singh and several candidates in Vancouver and addressed the Chiang scandal directly.
“He is a police officer, and he ought to know that when the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] went out and put a bounty on anybody, including Canadians, that cannot be acceptable. That is intimidation at its worst,” Kwan said.
“And yet, he played right into it. He advocated for people to bring [Tay] to the Chinese consulate to collect the bounty. In what universe is this normal?”
Kwan added the remarks are especially damaging while Canada is facing “active, sophisticated foreign interference activities targeting Canada’s democratic institutions.”
The Hong Kong Canadian groups described Chiang’s apology as “insincere” and “a tactic to downplay the seriousness of his outrageous comments.” They argue that any politician “truly sympathetic to oppressed Hongkongers” would never suggest delivering a Canadian citizen to a hostile foreign government’s diplomatic outpost.
“Chiang’s remarks legitimize foreign interference and potentially threaten Tay’s safety,” the statement reads. “This is not just about an offhand comment — it’s about whether our elected officials are willing to stand up to transnational repression or not.”
The joint release also cites findings from a national survey showing that 85.4% of Hongkonger-Canadian respondents are deeply concerned about transnational repression and infiltration in Canada, while 40.9% reported reducing public political engagement due to safety fears.
“Chiang’s remarks exemplify how foreign interference continues to cast a shadow over Hong Kong immigrants’ lives in Canada,” the groups said, emphasizing that more than 60% of respondents are alarmed by Canada’s handling of relations with China, particularly the influence of Chinese diplomatic institutions operating within Canadian borders.
“The Liberal Party must send a clear message that intimidation or threats against political candidates will not be tolerated,” the statement continues. “Canadians — particularly those who fled authoritarian regimes — deserve a democracy free from foreign interference.”
The Bureau has contacted the Liberal Party for further comment. This is a developing story. More to follow.
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2025 Federal Election
Canadian officials warn Communist China ‘highly likely’ to interfere in 2025 election

From LifeSiteNews
The Canadian government believes China will use specific tools ahead of the April election such as AI and social media to specifically target ‘Chinese ethnic, cultural, and religious communities in Canada using clandestine and deceptive means.’
Canadian officials from the Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections (SITE) Task Force warned that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) government will most likely try to interfere in Canada’s upcoming federal election.
Vanessa Lloyd, chair of the task force, observed during a March 24 press conference that “it is expected that the People’s Republic of China, or PRC, will likely continue to target Canadian democratic institutions and civil society to advance its strategic objectives.”
SITE is made up of representatives of multiple Canadian departments and agencies that have a security mandate.
Lloyd’s regular job is as the Deputy Director of Operations, second in charge, for Canada’s spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS).
According to Lloyd, officials from China as well as CCP proxies will be “likely to conduct foreign interference activity using a complex array of both overt and covert mechanisms.”
Her warning comes after the final report from the Foreign Interference Commission concluded that operatives from the CCP may have had a hand in helping to elect a handful of MPs in both the 2019 and 2021 Canadian federal elections. It also concluded that China was the primary foreign interference threat to Canada.
The commission shed light on how CCP agents and proxies conduct election interference, with one method being to rally community groups to make sure certain election candidates are looked down upon.
According to Lloyd, it is “highly likely” that China will engage in certain election meddling using specific tools such as AI.
“The PRC is highly likely to use AI-enabled tools to attempt to interfere with Canada’s democratic process in this current election,” she noted, adding that China will also use social media as well to “specifically target Chinese ethnic, cultural, and religious communities in Canada using clandestine and deceptive means.”
Lloyd also noted that the Indian government could also be involved in meddling, as it has the “intent and capability” to “assert its geopolitical influence.”
Canada will hold its next federal election on April 28 after Prime Minister Mark Carney triggered it on Sunday.
As reported by LifeSiteNews earlier in the month, a new exposé by investigative journalist Sam Cooper claims there is compelling evidence that Carney and former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau are strongly influenced by an “elite network” of foreign actors, including those with ties to communist China and the World Economic Forum.
In light of multiple accusations of foreign meddling in Canadian elections, the federal Foreign Interference Commission was convened last year to “examine and assess the interference by China, Russia, and other foreign states or non-state actors, including any potential impacts, to confirm the integrity of, and any impacts on, the 43rd and 44th general elections (2019 and 2021 elections) at the national and electoral district levels.”
The commission was formed after Trudeau’s special rapporteur, former Governor General David Johnston, failed in an investigation into CCP allegations after much delay. That inquiry was not done in public and was headed by Johnston, who is a “family friend” of Trudeau.
Johnston quit as “special rapporteur” after a public outcry following his conclusion that there should not be a public inquiry into the matter. Conservative MPs demanded Johnston be replaced over his ties to China and the Trudeau family.
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