Wikileaks founder holed up in Ecuadorian embassy in UK capital says he believed interrogation on rape and molestation claims was to go ahead

A Swedish prosecutor has cancelled an appointment to interview Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy in London, according to the Wikileaks founder, who has been living in the building for nearly three years to avoid extradition.

Assange said Marianne Ny had led his lawyers to believe that an appointment to take a statement from him would take place on Wednesday and described the cancellation as reckless.

But Ny said the meeting would have to be called off because she had not received official permission from Ecuador to enter its London embassy.

“Some formal approval has not come, and it is unclear when the matter can be resolved,” the prosecutor Marianne Ny wrote to Assange’s lawyers at 3.47pm on Wednesday, in email correspondence seen by the Guardian. “It is therefore no longer necessary to carry out investigative measures this week.”

Swedish prosecutors have been trying since 2010 to question Assange about allegations of rape and sexual molestation, although he has never been charged. He entered the embassy three years ago on Friday and has remained there to avoid a perceived threat of being sent on from Sweden to the US for publishing military secrets.

Lawyers for Assange claimed a victory in March after Ny bowed to pressure from the courts and agreed to break the deadlock in the case by interviewing him in London. Ny’s formal request to interrogate him in the Ecuadorian embassy was the first sign of movement in a case that has been frozen since August 2012.

Assange said on Wednesday: “This afternoon, the Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny cancelled a prospective appointment to take my statement today. We proposed the dates and Ny accepted them.

“Prosecutor Ny led my lawyers to believe that the appointment was proceeding. My lawyers had booked tickets and I have been put to considerable expense. Last year, the Swedish court of appeal found that prosecutor Ny had breached her duty because she had refused to take my statement for four and a half years.

“The prosecutor waited another seven months before finally accepting my offer to take my statement in London. Today, I learned that the Swedish legal application to Ecuador, which is likely to take weeks, was only sent to Ecuador two days ago.

“To behave in such a way seems reckless and it is hard to imagine that it was more than a public relations exercise. It is impossible to maintain confidence in this prosecutor under such circumstances.”

The foreign ministry of Ecuador issued a statement on Wednesday saying it had received a request at its Stockholm embassy on Friday 12 June from the prosecutor for legal assistance in carrying out the interrogation, and that it was considering this request.



Per Samuelson, a lawyer for Assange in Stockholm who had been due to fly to London on Tuesday night, said that Ingrid Isgren, a deputy prosecutor charged with conducting the interrogation, was already in London.

A spokesperson for the prosecutor said he was unable to confirm or deny that Isgren was in London, or that Ny had sent an email to Assange’s lawyers calling off the interrogation.

“We haven’t cancelled any meetings, we have not confirmed any dates … We have said we will do everything to get this interview done before the end of July,” he said.

Ny has previously said that she changed her mind about going to London because the statute of limitations on several of the crimes of which Assange is suspected runs out in August 2015.

“My view has always been that to perform an interview with him at the Ecuadorian embassy in London would lower the quality of the interview, and that he would need to be present in Sweden in any case should there be a trial in the future. This assessment remains unchanged,” Ny said in a statement earlier this year.

“Now that time is of the essence, I have viewed it therefore necessary to accept such deficiencies to the investigation and likewise take the risk that the interview does not move the case forward, particularly as there are no other measures on offer without Assange being present in Sweden.”

• This article was amended on 17 June 2015 to clarify quotes from Marianne Ny. The earlier version included the Guardian’s own translation from her statement in Swedish. These have been replaced with an English version of the statement issued by Ny’s office.