Manning offers guilty pleas in WikiLeaks case

Pfc. Bradley Manning offered guilty pleas to 10 of the 22
counts he has been charged with for his role in leaking documents to the
website WikiLeaks.

Manning, though, pleaded not guilty to the most serious charge of
aiding the enemy.

{mosads}The Associated Press reported Manning entered the guilty
pleas Thursday and a military judge was weighing whether to accept them.

If accepted, Manning would face up to 20 years in prison for
the 10 counts to which he pleaded guilty. Those counts were for sending hundreds of thousands
of classified documents to WikiLeaks, according to the AP.

The charge of aiding the enemy, which he did not plead guilty to, could lead to a life sentence if convicted.

Manning spoke for more than an hour in the courtroom Thursday as he read from a 35-page statement explaining why he leaked the documents to WikiLeaks, according to Reuters.

“I believe that if the general public … had access to the information … this could spark a domestic debate as to the role of the military and foreign policy in general,” Manning said, according to Reuters.

“I felt I accomplished something that would allow me to have a clear conscience,” he said.

Manning has been jailed for more than 1,000 days for his
alleged role in the massive leaking of documents to WikiLeaks.

–This report was updated at 1:44 p.m.