The legal team of Julian Assange has filed a criminal complaint in Ecuador, accusing the staff of its London embassy of spying on the journalist. Assange's lawyer, Carlos Poveda, has shared details of the case with RT.

The complaint against the embassy was submitted to the attorney general's office in Ecuador on behalf of Assange on Monday. The journalist has been targeted with blanket surveillance for about two years – and subjected to an extortion attempt, Poveda said. The compromised data includes legal, medical and personal information on Assange, yet his legal team did not disclose to whom exactly it had been allegedly leaked.

Read more

Apart from Ecuador, the case – namely the alleged extortion attempt – is being investigated by Spanish authorities, as three Spanish nationals are believed to be involved into it.

“It's all related to the leak of the personal data of Julian Assange,” Poveda told RT. “They've been initially used in Madrid by three Spanish citizens, who tried to blackmail the WikiLeaks boss. Urged him to pay up €3 million, threatening to publish the information.”

The spying effort appears to be well coordinated, given the amount – some 90 thousand – of compromised documents, Poveda believes. The most damaging part is that the malicious actors have apparently took a sneak peek at the defense strategy of Assange's legal team – and tried to sell it later as well.

“We believe there's been a sort of conspiracy between the three Spaniards involved in the blackmail, Promsecurity private contractor, that has been overseeing and administering surveillance at the embassy and, as we believe, the diplomatic mission of Ecuador in London itself,” Poveda stressed.

Julian Assange was forcibly removed by British police from the embassy on April 11 after Ecuador's President Lenin Moreno suspended his asylum. While Moreno accused Assange of spying on the embassy, the new revelations by the WikiLeaks co-founder's legal team suggest that the situation might have been just the opposite. Several videos of Assange living within the embassy – apparently taken by surveillance cameras – have already surfaced in the media since his arrest.

Also on rt.com Ecuador sold out Julian Assange to get US approval for lavish IMF loan – father

Think your friends would be interested? Share this story!