Assange faces arrest by British police if he leaves the building and, with the exception of occasional trips to the embassy balcony, has not been outside for years.
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Swedish prosecutors want to question Assange over allegations of rape stemming from a work visit he made to the country in 2010 when WikiLeaks was attracting worldwide attention for a trove of documents leaked by US Army Private Chelsea Manning (then known as Bradley).
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is set to be questioned by Swedish prosecutors inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London, potentially breaking a stalemate in an nearly five-year-long investigation into alleged sex crimes. Here’s more from Frank.
“Swedish police want to question Assange over sexual offenses he’s accused of committing in Sweden going back to 2010”.
He has fought against being extradited to Sweden, saying he fears he would then be transferred to the United States to face charges on Wikileaks’ activities.
“The Swedes say they have to interview Assange before they can decide whether to charge him. Ecuador has refused to turn Assange over due to what it calls ‘fears of political persecution'”.
As Frank reports, Assange has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing regarding the Swedish allegations.
The Swedish government recently made a formal request to interview Assange in Ecuador’s London embassy, a shift in policy that could mark an end to the stalemate between Swedish authorities and the whistleblower.
“In the coming weeks, a date will be established for the proceedings to be held at the Embassy of Ecuador in the United Kingdom”, the statement read.
She said however that the exact date of the interview has not yet been pinned down.
There are now no charges filed against him in the US.
As the AP reports, “Assange’s defense team said in a statement that it welcomed the steps to take the WikiLeaks founder’s statement, which it said ‘comes after six years of complete inaction on the part of the Swedish prosecutor'”.
Julian Assange has been in the embassy for so long that the statute of limitations expired for some of the allegations facing him have expired.
The New York Times reports that Karin Rosander, a spokeswoman for the Swedish prosecutor’s office, said that the investigation was nearly finished, but that “the interview with the suspect has been missing all the time”. “Another outcome of the delay is that several of the accusations are now barred due to the statute of limitations”.
Ecuador’s decision to continue to grant asylum to Assange has sparked friction with not just Sweden and the USA, but also the U.K. But on Wednesday Ecuador’s Foreign Ministry was unequivocal in reaffirming the country’s support for both the United Nations ruling and the whistleblower’s continued asylym.
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