Earlier today in London, British police arrested Russian intelligence partner and head of WikiLeaks Julian Assange and carried him from the Ecuadorian embassy. He was taken to a Metropolitan Police station awaiting an appearance before a magistrate. He faces a U.S. extradition warrant in connection with WikiLeaks' release of secret and sensitive U.S. documents.
The Ecuadorian government had revoked his asylum after nearly seven years. Ecuadorian President Lenin Moreno announced the decision to have Assange removed:
“Today I announce that that the discourteous and aggressive behavior of Mr. Julian Assange, the hostile and threatening declarations of its allied organization, against Ecuador, and especially the transgression of international treaties, have led the situation to a point where the asylum of Mr. Assange is unsustainable and no longer viable."Beyond being an unpleasant guest of the embassy, Assange's organization has increasingly been hacking and releasing damaging information and data from the U.S. government and other allies, and provided an outlet for hacked e-mails from the Democratic National Committee that were damaging to Hillary Clinton's campaign in 2016. Russia and other authoritarian countries have not been targets of Assange's organization over the years.
Proceedings at the U.S. District Court for Eastern Virginia inadvertently disclosed that Assange was the subject of a sealed criminal complaint, presumably related to the Russian government's interference in the 2016 elections (UPDATE: it turns out to be related to facilitating the Chelsea Manning leaks).
Check BBC for updates here.
BONUS:
Per pool, President Trump is offering his first reaction to the Julian Assange arrest: “I know nothing about Wikileaks. It’s not my thing.”— Eamon Javers (@EamonJavers) April 11, 2019
He only mentioned WikiLeaks 141 times during the 2016 campaign.
(photo: A bearded Assange is carried from Ecuadorian embassy, apparently kicking and screaming; the police officer's smile is priceless. Screenshot from SkyNews video)
