WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was yesterday expelled from his hideout in Ecuador’s embassy in the UK and promptly arrested by London police amid concerns he faces extradition to the US.
London police said that Assange was arrested moments after Ecuadoran President Lenin Moreno said on Twitter that the country had withdrawn his diplomatic asylum.
Video showed a bearded Assange being dragged out of the embassy and placed in a waiting police van.
The 47-year-old has been in the Ecuadoran embassy since 2012, when he sought to escape questioning in a Swedish sexual assault case.
While those charges were dropped in 2017, Assange has remained in the small London apartment as he has continued to dodge British police and US prosecutors.
Assange’s exit from the embassy ends a nearly seven-year standoff between the controversial transparency advocate and British authorities.
While he would initially face punishment for jumping bail, Assange faces the possibility of a looming extradition request by the US.
“Julian Assange is no hero and no one is above the law,” British Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Jeremy Hunt said on Twitter. “He has hidden from the truth for years.”
Jennifer Robinson, a lawyer for Assange, declined to immediately comment.
WikiLeaks said on Twitter that Ecuador had “illegally” terminated Assange’s asylum.
London police said that Assange was taken to a nearby station and would then appear at Westminster Magistrates Court.
The police said in a statement that they were invited into the embassy.
Assange’s relationship with his Ecuadoran protectors has deteriorated over the years.
He has had spats over Internet access and even faced criminal charges for hacking into the embassy’s computer system.
On Wednesday, WikiLeaks officials held a news conference to accuse Ecuador of spying on Assange.
“The discourteous and aggressive behavior of Mr Julian Assange, the hostile and threatening declarations of his allied organization, against Ecuador, and especially the transgression of international treaties” meant the situation is “unsustainable and no longer viable,” Moreno said in a video posted on Twitter.
WikiLeaks and Assange became famous in 2010, when the organization published government secrets leaked by US Army soldier Chelsea Manning.
More recently, the Web site put itself at the center of the 2016 US presidential race by publishing hacked e-mails from former US secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign.
While the US case is still sealed, prosecutors in court filings last year might have inadvertently revealed that Assange had been charged.
In a matter unrelated to Assange, federal prosecutors in Virginia said that “no other procedure is likely to keep confidential the fact that Assange has been charged.”
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese