WASHINGTON • Former US Army soldier and WikiLeaks source Chelsea Manning has been released from prison on a judge's order after being held since last May for refusing to testify in an ongoing US investigation of WikiLeaks.

US district court judge Anthony Trenga in Alexandria, Virginia, ordered Ms Manning released on Thursday because the grand jury hearing the case had concluded its deliberations.

Alexandria city sheriff Dana Lawhorne told reporters that Ms Manning had been released from the Alexandria Detention Centre.

Judge Trenga rejected a request from Ms Manning to cancel fines he had imposed for her refusal to testify and ordered her to pay fines totalling US$256,000 (S$361,000).

A detention hearing for Ms Manning scheduled for yesterday was cancelled.

"Needless to say, we are relieved and ask that you respect her privacy while she gets on her feet," Ms Manning's defence team said in an e-mail statement.

On Wednesday, a spokesman for the defence team said Ms Manning had attempted suicide and had been taken to hospital, where she was recovering.

He said Ms Manning remained "unwavering in her refusal to participate in a secret grand jury process that she sees as highly susceptible to abuse".

Prior to her incarceration for refusing to testify, Ms Manning had served seven years in a military prison for leaking hundreds of thousands of US military messages and cables to WikiLeaks, before being released on the order of then US President Barack Obama.

WikiLeaks, an Internet-based "dead letter drop" for leakers of classified or sensitive information, was founded by Australian Julian Assange in 2006.

Assange is being held in a London prison as British courts consider a request from US prosecutors for his extradition to the United States.

He is wanted on charges of conspiring with Ms Manning to hack into a Pentagon computer system containing classified materials.

REUTERS