A week after Sweden complicated US efforts to get the UK to extradite Julian Assange by reopening an investigation into a rape allegation against the WikiLeaks founder, Ecuador has enabled the US government to expand its extradition case. It did so by seizing all personal belongings and electronic devices left by Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where he lived for 7 years before Ecuador revoked his political asylum earlier this year.
WikiLeaks’ editor in chief Kristinn Hrafnsson called the seizure “disgraceful,” adding that “Ecuador granted him asylum because of the threat of extradition to the US and now the same country, under new leadership, is actively collaborating with a criminal investigation against him.” Hrafnsson labeled Ecuadorian President Lenin Moreno a “puppet” of the US government and said that Assange had taken steps to secure the information on his computers. “If anything surfaces, I can assure you it would’ve been planted,” she stated.
Read more: Battle breaks out for WikiLeaks founder Assange’s computers
