There are not many details on this news yet. ITV reports:
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has been arrested at the Ecuadorian embassy.
He has been taken into custody at a central London police station where he will remain, before being presented before Westminster Magistrates' Court as soon as is possible.
The 47-year-old Assange has been staying at the embassy under asylum since 2012 after facing charges of rape and sexual molestation from Swedish authorities two years before.
The BBC in October published a timeline on the charges against Assange and authorities’ actions since he his arrest and making bail in the UK in 2010 and the nation’s supreme court ruling in 2012 that he be extradited to Sweden.
The BBC reports:
The Met Police said he was arrested for failing to surrender to the court.
Ecuador's president Lenin Moreno said it withdrew Mr Assange's asylum after his repeated violations to international conventions.
The Guardian reports:
Scotland Yard said: “He has been taken into custody at a central London police station where he will remain, before being presented before Westminster magistrates court as soon as is possible.
“The MPS [Metropolitan Police Service] had a duty to execute the warrant, on behalf of Westminster magistrates court, and was invited into the embassy by the ambassador, following the Ecuadorian government’s withdrawal of asylum.”
Ecuador’s president, Lenín Moreno, said on Twitter: “In a sovereign decision, Ecuador withdrew the asylum status to Julian Assange after his repeated violations to international conventions and daily-life protocols.”
But WikiLeaks said Moreno had acted illegally in terminating Assange’s political asylum “in violation of international law”.