Sweden says WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange remains under arrest warrant

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has lived at Ecuador's London embassy since June 2012.

Sweden's Attorney-General says he is confident Julian Assange will remain subject to an arrest warrant relating to allegations of sexual assault.

Attorney-General Anders Perklev also reaffirmed his confidence in Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny, who for more than four-and-a-half years refused to interview the Australian WikiLeaks publisher in London, but abruptly changed her mind last month after Sweden's highest court decided to hear an appeal by Mr Assange asking that the warrant for his arrest be quashed.

In an interview with Sweden's Expressen newspaper, Mr Perklev denied that Mr Assange's high profile and "special" circumstances had any impact on the handling of his case and insisted that the matter was being dealt with "entirely under Swedish law".

Mr Assange has lived at Ecuador's London embassy since June 2012. Ecuador has granted him political asylum on the grounds that he is at risk of extradition to the United States to face espionage and conspiracy charges arising from the leaking of thousands of secret diplomatic and military documents by US Army private Chelsea Manning.

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Last month, a US court confirmed that WikiLeaks and Mr Assange are still being targeted by the US Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation in a criminal investigation relating to espionage, conspiracy, theft of US government property and computer fraud.

British police are on guard outside the Ecuadorian embassy 24 hours a day, waiting to arrest Mr Assange so he can be extradited to Sweden for questioning about the sexual assault allegations. The allegations were first raised in August 2010.

Mr Assange denies the allegations and his lawyers have advised that his extradition to Stockholm could facilitate his eventual extradition to the US.

Last month, Sweden's Supreme Court decided to hear an appeal by Mr Assange seeking to quash the arrest warrant on the grounds that prosecutors had failed to progress the case by refusing to interview him in London and that he had been denied access to key facts forming the basis for the decision to arrest him.

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Sweden says WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange remains under arrest warrant