Assange Arrested on Sex Charges: WikiLeaks Founder Will Fight Extradition from UK
LONDON (CBS/AP) British police said Tuesday that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange had been arrested on a Swedish warrant seeking his detention for questioning in a sex-crimes investigation of the man who has angered Washington by spilling thousands of government secrets on the Internet.
Assange was arrested early Tuesday and is currently appearing at Westminster Magistrate's Court.
Assange told a judge that he will fight extradition, reports the Associated Press.
CBS News correspondent Elizabeth Palmer reports that Tuesday's court
hearing is the first step in what will likely be a lengthy process for British law officials to decide whether Assange
should be extradited to Sweden to face the allegations.
A spokesman for WikiLeaks called Assange's arrest an attack on media freedom and said it won't prevent the organization from releasing more secret documents.
"This will not change our operation," Kristinn Hrafnsson told The Associated Press.
Assange's lawyer said Monday he was arranging to deliver the WikiLeaks founder to British police for questioning. He surrendered Tuesday under an agreement reached with the police.
Assange had been staying at an undisclosed location in Britain.
The 39-year-old Australian is wanted on suspicion of rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion in Sweden, and the case could lead to his extradition. Interpol placed Assange on its most-wanted list on Nov. 30 after Sweden issued an arrest warrant. Last week, Sweden's highest court upheld the detention order.
The WikiLeaks website, which has been bumped off two U.S. companies' servers, remained online Tuesday via a Swiss domain name provider. No new U.S. diplomatic cables appeared on the site Tuesday, but it wasn't clear whether that was related to Assange's arrest.