Chelsea Manning, who sent more than 700,000 confidential documents, videos and diplomatic cables to Wikileaks, has told BBC News she would have published them herself, if Julian Assange had not.
Speaking to the Hardtalk programme’s Stephen Sackur, Manning denied her actions had put lives at risk, saying “the US government didn’t show that in court”.
In 2013, Manning was court martialled and sentenced to 35 years in prison. One of former President Barack Obama’s last acts in office was to commute her sentence, in 2017.
Manning, who did not read all the documents before leaking them, said she “chose certain categories of information under the understanding” they did not identify sources, and “did have access to” many other documents she had not leaked.
Watch the full interview on Tuesday, 22, and Wednesday, 23 November, on BBC World News, or watch again on BBC iPlayer (UK only).
