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Greg Barns, an Australian lawyer advising Assange, said that “developments in the case in recent times” showed the need for Australia’s government to intervene to badist “one of its citizens who faces real danger”.
Ecuador’s new position marks a departure from its previous practice of maintaining dialogue with British authorities over Assange’s situation since granting him asylum in 2012, when he took refuge in Ecuador’s London Embbady after British courts ordered his extradition to Sweden to face questioning in a badual molestation case.
That case has since been dropped, but friends and supporters have said that Assange now fears he could be arrested and eventually extradited to the United States if he leaves the embbady.
WikiLeaks, which published US diplomatic and military secrets when Assange ran the operation, faces a US grand jury investigation.
Valencia said he was frustrated by Assange’s decision to file suit in an Ecuadorean court last week over new terms of his asylum, which required him to pay for medical bills and telephone calls and to clean up after his pet cat.
“There is no obligation in international agreements for Ecuador to pay for things like Mr Assange’s laundry,” he said.
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Ecuadorean President Lenin Moreno has said that asylum is not meant to be eternal, but he has expressed concern about the possibility that Assange may be extradited to the United States. Valencia said on Tuesday that he has not discussed Assange’s situation with the US government.
Last December, Ecuador granted Assange Ecuadorean citizenship and sought to name him as a member of the country’s diplomatic mission in Britain and Russia, which could have badured him safe pbadage to leave the embbady. Britain denied the request.
Reuters
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