Ecuador's foreign minister has said that rape and sexual assault cases lodged in Sweden against Julian Assange are laughable, but no ruling has yet been made on the WikiLeaks founder's asylum application.
“Personally, (I think) this is hilarious,” Ecuadorean chief diplomat Ricardo Patino told reporters, explaining that Assange “is charged because his condom broke.” Assange is currently at the Ecuadorean embassy in London, seeking political asylum in the Latin American country.
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Ecuadorean officials are examining the allegations of sexual misconduct in their review of Assange’s application. Patino said that one of the alleged victims filed a complaint, because she “realised that on certain nights, the condom broke”.
Assange, an Australian, maintains he only had consensual sexual relations with the alleged victims.
The website founder fears that if extradited to Sweden, he will be subsequently re-extradited to the United States to stand trial for espionage, on account of the 250,000 US diplomatic cables that were published.
WikiLeaks release Syrian files
WikiLeaks has published the first batch of more than two million e-mails from Syrian politicians, government officials and companies. “The material is embarrassing to Syria, but it is also embarrassing to Syria’s opponents,” Assange said in a prepared statement.u00a0
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