Lawyer seeks dismissal of Wikileaks case

A lawyer for a US Army soldier charged with leaking hundreds of thousands of pages of classified information has asked a military judge to dismiss the charges against his client, arguing that the government bungled the handing over of documents in the case.

Private Bradley Manning was in court in Fort Meade, Maryland, for a military hearing in his case today.

Military prosecutors say the 24-year-old downloaded and sent to the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks hundreds of thousands of sensitive documents and diplomatic cables.

Defence lawyers say Manning was a troubled young soldier whom the Army should never have deployed to Iraq or given access to classified material.

Manning’s lawyer argues that the government does not understand its obligation to hand over documents.

The government says it has complied with the rules.