Crowley: U.S. has no involvement in Assange case

PanARMENIAN.Net - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was released on bail Dec. 16 - confined to a supporter's 600-acre estate but free to get back to work spilling U.S. government secrets on his website as he fights Sweden's attempt to extradite him on allegations of rape and molestation.

The Australian, who surrendered to British police Dec. 7, will have to observe a curfew, wear an electronic tag and report to police in person every day.

But there are no restrictions on his Internet use, even as U.S. authorities consider charges related to thousands of leaked diplomatic cables and other secret documents WikiLeaks has released. The site has released just 1,621 of the more than 250,000 State Department documents it claims to possess, many of them containing critical or embarrassing U.S. assessments of foreign nations and their leaders.

Assange insists that publishing the documents was essential to expose government wrongdoing. In particular, he has referred repeatedly to one cable that asked diplomats to gather information on United Nations staff such as their passwords, frequent flier numbers and even biometric information.

State Department officials say the cable originated from the U.S. intelligence community and deny Assange's contention that it ordered diplomats to spy. On Thursday, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva continued America's damage-control efforts over the document.

In Washington, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley stressed that the U.S. has no involvement in Sweden's case.

"Perhaps that will put the conspiracy theories to bed once and for all," he said, AP reported.