Why Is Julian Assange En Route To Saipan Island?

The Austrailian editor and publisher of Wikileaks, Julian Assange is now finally a ‘free man’. On 25th June, the United Kingdom has released him and now he is en route to a courtroom in Saipan Island where he is likely to admit guilt on Wednesday for one criminal charge as part of a deal. This deal means he will be released and can go back to Australia, ending a 14-year legal journey.

Where is Saipan?

Saipan is the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands. A U.S. land in the western pacific which begins roughly 70 kilometers North of Guam and it includes 14 islands on its name.

Similar to territories such as Guam or Puerto Rico,the Northern Mariana Islands are part of the U.S. without the full status of a state. The Habitants on the Islands are U.S. citizens but then they can’t vote in U.S. presidential elections.

Assange reached there at 9 a.m. on Wednesday.

Why has Assange gone there?

Assange’s lawyers have demanded that he plead guilty and go forward with the last legal formalities in a court near his homeland, Australia.

The Saipan Court is relatively closer to Australia, roughly 3,000 km South of the island. Whereas, the other option Hawaii is more than twice as far away.

“He has to front up to charges that have been brought under U.S. law,” said Emily Crawford, a professor at the University of Sydney’s law school.

“It had to be U.S. territory but it had to be the U.S. territory closest to Australia that wasn’t a U.S. state like Hawaii.”

Saipan and U.S. History

After being the property of first Spain followed by Germany and then Japan, the United States finally after world war II took Saipan under its control precisely after the Battle of Saipan in 1944.

Then in 1975, the residents voted in favor to join the United States as a territory .

The Northern Mariana Island then delegated an elected person to the U.S. House of Representatives for the first time in 2008, however this delegate has no vote in the Congress.