LONDON– WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said yesterday he and colleagues were taking steps to protect themselves after death threats following the publication of leaked US diplomatic cables on their website.
One of Mr Assange’s lawyers said he would also fight any attempt to extradite his client to face questions over alleged sexual misconduct.
Answering questions online from an undisclosed location, the 39-year-old Australian said anyone making threats against his life should be charged with incitement to murder.
“The threats against our lives are a matter of public record. However, we are taking the appropriate precautions to the degree that we are able when dealing with a superpower,” Mr Assange told the Guardian website.
Mr Assange, who is reported to be somewhere in southern England, has his own legal problems.Swedish authorities said information missing from a European arrest warrant they had issued against him for alleged sex crimes, had been handed to Britain.
Meanwhile, WikiLeaks directed readers to web addresses in Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria and Finland yesterday after two US Internet providers ditched it in the space of two days, and Paris tried to ban French servers from hosting its trove of leaked data.
The Internet publisher directed users to www.wikileaks.ch, www.wikileaks.nl and other sites after the wikileaks.org site on which it had published classified US government information vanished from view for about six hours. – (Reuters)