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WikiLeaks’ Assange ‘Unlawfully Detained’ In Ecuador Embassy

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s three-and-a-half-year stay in the Ecuadorian embassy in London amounts to ‘unlawful detention’, a United Nations panel examining his appeal will rule … Continue reading WikiLeaks’ Assange ‘Unlawfully Detained’ In Ecuador Embassy


ekucudorWikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s three-and-a-half-year stay in the Ecuadorian embassy in London amounts to ‘unlawful detention’, a United Nations panel examining his appeal will rule on Friday, the BBC reported.

Assange, a former computer hacker who has been holed up in the embassy since June 2012, told the U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention that he was a political refugee whose rights had been infringed by being unable to take up asylum in Ecuador.

Reuters was unable to immediately confirm to the BBC report but the UN said the panel’s opinion, which is not legally binding, was due to be published on Friday.

Britain said it had never arbitrarily detained Assange and that the Australian had voluntarily avoided arrest by jumping bail to flee to the embassy.

It said Assange will be arrested if he leaves the embassy and then extradited to Sweden for questioning over allegations of rape in 2010. Assange denies the rape allegations.

“Should the U.N. announce tomorrow that I have lost my case against the United Kingdom and Sweden, I shall exit the embassy at noon on Friday to accept arrest by British police as there is no meaningful prospect of further appeal,” Assange said in a statement posted on the Wikileaks Twitter account.

“However, should I prevail and the state parties be found to have acted unlawfully, I expect the immediate return of my passport and the termination of further attempts to arrest me.”

A decision in his favor would mark the latest twist in a tumultuous journey for Assange since he incensed the United States and its allies by using his WikiLeaks website to leak hundreds of thousands of secret U.S. diplomatic and military cables in 2010, disclosures that often embarrassed Washington.

Assange, 44, fears Sweden will extradite him to the United States, where he could be put on trial over WikiLeaks’ publication of the classified military and diplomatic documents, one of the largest information leaks in U.S. history.

He made international headlines in early 2010 when WikiLeaks published classified U.S. military video showing a 2007 attack by Apache helicopters that killed a dozen people in Baghdad, including two Reuters news staff.

Later that year, the group released over 90,000 secret documents detailing the U.S.-led military campaign in Afghanistan, followed by almost 400,000 internal U.S. military reports detailing operations in Iraq.

Those disclosures were followed by the release of more than 250,000 classified cables from U.S. embassies. It would go on to add almost three million more diplomatic cables dating back to 1973.