Ecuador has revoked the citizenship of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. According to a court in the capital, Quito, irregularities were found in the procedure for his naturalization. For example, different signatures would have been placed and forgery would have taken place.
And the lawyer for Assange, who is being held in Britain, announced that he would appeal the decision. He asks for an explanation and wants to cancel the decision.
Assange became an Ecuadorean citizen in 2018 after living for years at the Ecuadorean Embassy in London. In 2012, he sought asylum there because he was threatened with arrest in Sweden after allegations of sexual assault. Assange wanted to avoid extradition to the United States, where he would likely face a long prison sentence for espionage over his WikiLeaks revelations.
In 2019, Ecuador withdrew Assange’s refugee status, after which British police arrested him. He was sentenced to nearly a year in prison for breaching bail conditions in the abuse case. Sweden dropped the case at the end of 2019, but Assange is still fighting a legal battle against extradition to the United States.
