Claim: Julian Assange has a perceived role in publishing secret American documents, making him fear extradition to the United States.

Julian Paul Assange -LRB- -LSB- əˈsɒnʒ -RSB- born Julian Paul Hawkins , 3 July 1971 -RRB- is an Australian computer programmer and the founder of WikiLeaks , an organisation which he founded in 2006 . He has won accolades including the Sam Adams Award and Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism .   Assange founded WikiLeaks in 2006 , but came to global prominence in 2010 , when WikiLeaks published a series of leaks provided by Chelsea Manning . These leaks included the Collateral Murder video -LRB- April 2010 -RRB- , the Afghanistan war logs -LRB- July 2010 -RRB- , the Iraq war logs -LRB- October 2010 -RRB- , and CableGate -LRB- November 2010 -RRB- . Following the 2010 leaks , the United States government launched a criminal investigation into WikiLeaks and asked allied nations for assistance .   In November 2010 , a request was made for Assange 's extradition to Sweden , where he had been questioned months earlier over allegations of sexual assault and rape . Assange continued to deny the allegations , and expressed concern that he would be extradited from Sweden to the United States because of his perceived role in publishing secret American documents . Assange surrendered himself to UK police on 7 December 2010 , and was held for ten days in solitary confinement before being released on bail . He sought and was granted asylum by Ecuador in August 2012 . He has since remained in the Embassy of Ecuador in London , and is unable to leave without being arrested for breaching his bail conditions . On 19 May 2017 , the Swedish prosecutors dropped the investigation into rape accusations against Assange and applied to revoke his arrest warrant , although the Metropolitan Police have indicated that an arrest warrant is still in force for Assange 's failure to surrender himself to the British court .