WikiLeaks says Manning verdict a 'strategic victory'

(AFP) WikiLeaks hailed the sentencing of their source Bradley Manning on Wednesday to 35 years in a US prison as a "significant strategic victory".

The anti-secrecy website, founded by Julian Assange, saw victory in how soon US soldier Manning would be eligible for release.

"Significant strategic victory in Bradley Manning case. Bradley Manning now eligible for release in less than nine years, 4.4 in one calculation," WikiLeaks tweeted.

WikiLeaks shot to international prominence in 2010 when it began publishing hundreds of thousands of documents obtained by Manning, who was a junior intelligence analyst at a US base near Baghdad at the time.

Manning was convicted of espionage and other crimes last month, having earlier admitted being the source of the battlefield reports from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and confidential US diplomatic cables.

Assange has been stuck in Ecuador's embassy in London for more than a year as he tries to avoid extradition to Sweden for questioning over allegations of rape and sexual assault.

The Australian has said the allegations are a pretext to get him sent to the United States to face trial there.