With Julian Assange locked away in a London jail, a new battle has broken out over what may contain some of the WikiLeaks founder’s…
With Julian Assange locked away in a London jail, a new battle has broken out over what may contain some of the WikiLeaks founder’s biggest secrets: his computers.
On Monday, judicial authorities from Ecuador carried out an inventory of all the belongings and digital devices left behind at the London embassy following his expulsion last month from the diplomatic compound that had been his home the past seven years.
It came as Sweden announced it was seeking Assange’s arrest on suspicion of rape, setting up a possible future tug-of-war with the United States over any extradition of Assange from Britain.
It’s not known what devices authorities removed from the embassy or what information they contained. But authorities said they were acting on a request by the U. S. prosecutors, leading Assange’s defenders to claim that Ecuador has undermined the most basic principles of asylum while denying the secret-spiller’s right to prepare his defense.
„It’s disgraceful,“ WikiLeaks‘ editor in chief, Kristinn Hrafnsson, said in an interview with The Associated Press. „Ecuador granted him asylum because of the threat of extradition to the U. S. and now the same country, under new leadership, is actively collaborating with a criminal investigation against him.“
Assange, 47, was arrested on April 11 after being handed over to British authorities by Ecuador. He is serving a 50-week sentence in a London prison for skipping bail while the U. S. seeks his extradition for conspiring to hack into military computers and spill secrets about U.
