WikiLeaks’ Assange sets sights on leaving embassy: Now …

Summary: Some commentators have questioned if anything has changed, diplomatically and legally, in WikiLeaks' founder Julian Assange's case. Here's what could happen next.

Locked inside a small apartment in central London, the only reason Julian Assange has avoided arrest is that his dimly lit ground-floor bedroom also happens to be de facto Ecuadorian soil.

Marking almost exactly two years after the WikiLeaks founder gave a similar soundbite-laden speech on the balcony of the Ecuadorian embassy in Britain's capital, he yesterday opted for a more modest affair, only to offer a similar string of pointless remarks, which were all but retracted after the fact.

In case you missed it, Assange said he would leave the embassy "soon," after being holed up in the small embassy for more than two years.

Following the appearance on Monday morning, however, his spokesman Kristinn Hrafnsson said although Assange was ready to leave the embassy, it would only be when he is offered passage free from the threat of arrest.

Assange's message was anything but clear leaving more questions than answers. One being whether the political and legal situation has shifted since he first entered the embassy.

It hasn't. Very little has changed in the diplomatic standoff between Ecuador and the UK.

Assange, who founded the whistleblowing site WikiLeaks, rose to prominence in 2010 after the leak of classified US military documentson the Afghan and Iraq wars.He remains concerned that should he step outside of the protection of Ecuador's London embassy, he will first be extradited to Sweden where he faces accusations of sexual assault dating back to 2010 but then will be forced to travel to the US. An onwards extradition, he claims, could see him tried in a US court for espionage crimes for his involvement in the classified cache release.

The Australian-born hacker turned media figure and document leaker was arrested in Britain, but received bail as he awaited court decisions in efforts to rollback the extradition process.

Once the Supreme Court, the highest court in the UK, ruled against him, he fled to the Ecuadorian embassy to seek political asylum.

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