MANNING FREED AFTER OBAMA’S INTERVENTION
CHELSEA Manning has said she is “looking forward to breathing the warm spring air again” ahead of her release on Wednesday. Her sentence for leaking documents to Wikileaks was commuted by President Barack Obama, just before Donald Trump took over.
Shortening the former soldier’s sentence was one of his last acts as president.
Manning – who attended Tasker Milward school in Pembrokeshire for four years – has been serving a 35-year sentence at the military prison at Fort Leavenworth for leaking reams of war logs, diplomatic cables and battlefield video to the antisecrecy website WikiLeaks in 2010.
She was convicted under her previous name, Bradley, and shortly thereafter announced she would start living as a woman.
In an interview from prison with The Guardian, Chelsea said: “I’m looking forward to breathing warm spring air again.
“I want that indescribable feeling of connection with people and nature again, without razor wire or a visitation booth.
“I want to be able to hug my family and friends again. And swimming – I want to go swimming!”
Edward Snowden, the former American security agent who exposed the extent of state surveillance in the western world using Chelsea’s information, said: “I’m grateful that Chelsea will finally have a chance to enjoy the freedoms she gave so much to defend. Courage to her – and volume to her voice.”
Her Welsh aunt Sharon Staples, from Haverfordwest, and Wales-born mum Susan Manning have previous- the ly spoken of Ms Manning’s treatment in prison. Speaking to WalesOnline in 2014, her aunt Mrs Staples said: “What really hurt me was the treatment Chelsea received in Quantico two years before the trial: stripped naked, kept in solitary confinement, made to stand in a corner, everything taken away.”
It was reported that Ms Manning was locked up for up to 23 hours a day over a period of 11 months during solitary confinement.
On her release, Chelsea has said that she is going to live with her aunt Debbie in Maryland.
She told the newspaper: “I hope that these past few years have caused the army to think seriously about its treatment of Chelsea before and after she was deployed and make sure that other emotionally challenged soldiers are given proper treatment and are not sent into global hot spots when they are in serious need of psychological counselling.”