Wikileaks: US judge orders release of Chelsea Manning

A judge on Thursday ordered the release of ex-Wikileaks informer Chelsea Manning who, the day before, had attempted suicide from the prison where she was detained because of her refusal to testify before a grand jury.

Former US military analyst Chelsea Manning returned to prison

This grand jury having been dissolved Wednesday, "the court considers that the appearance of Mrs. Manning is no longer necessary and that her continued detention no longer meets an objective of coercion", decided Judge Anthony Trenga. However, the financial penalties that had been set to force her to testify on Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange remain valid and she will have to pay $ 256,000 in fines, he added.

700,000 documents leaked

Chelsea Manning, 32, had attempted suicide on Wednesday but authorities had intervened in time and she had been transferred to the hospital, according to her support group.

In 2010, Private Manning, then known by the name of Bradley, had leaked more than 700,000 confidential documents relating to the wars of Iraq and Afghanistan, including more than 250,000 diplomatic cables that had plunged the United States into the 'embarrassment.

The former intelligence analyst was sentenced in 2013 to 35 years in prison by a court martial, but his sentence was commuted by President Barack Obama. She was released in May 2017 after seven years in prison, during which she began her transition to the female sex.

In March 2019, this icon of transgender people had been imprisoned again because she refused to testify on Julian Assange before a grand jury.

"They want to ask me questions that I have already answered" during my trial, she had explained, denouncing an "opaque" procedure only intended, according to her, to send her back to bars.

Detained in the United Kingdom, the Australian opposes the extradition request made by the United States which wants to try him for spying. US officials say he sought the documents from Private Manning and helped him decipher a password, going beyond the role of a journalist.