An army judge has sentenced the US soldier Bradley Manning to 35 years in jail for passing huge quantities of official secrets to the transparency group Wikileaks.

Arguing that a tough sentence would deter other leakers, the prosecution had pushed for a sentence of 60 years during the hearing in Fort Meade, Maryland.

The judge, Col Denise Lund, in the end sentenced Manning to a spell in prison closer to the term worked for by his defence lawyers, who had put forward a request for 25 years.

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25-year-old Manning, who was cleared of aiding the enemy, but convicted of several violations of the espionage act, is slated to remain in jail until the age of 60.

The Private last week apologised for hurting the US and the "unexpected results" of his actions, which included the leak of 250,000 US diplomatic cables and 500,000 army reports.



