Spain: HSBC Whistleblower Released Pending Extradition Case

News965 - Yahoo, Jamey Keaten contributed from Geneva, April 5, 2018

MADRID -  Spanish authorities temporarily released a whistleblower in a major banking tax evasion scandal Thursday while a judge decides whether to extradite him to Switzerland, where he faces a 5-year prison sentence for economic espionage.

Herve Falciani, a former technology specialist at a subsidiary of HSBC bank, was arrested by Spanish police on Wednesday as part of a yearslong Swiss effort to detain him. Falciani, a French citizen, was tried in absentia in Switzerland and has not made himself available to Swiss authorities.

A Swiss court ruled in 2015 that Falciani illegally leaked a massive amount of account information that led to a global wave of tax evasion probes. Falciani also was convicted of illegally obtaining data and breaching business confidentiality and bank secrecy.

In Madrid on Thursday, a National Court judge released Falciani from custody, but confiscated his passport, limited his freedom of movement within Spain and ordered him put under police surveillance.

Anti-corruption activists consider Falciani a crucial whistleblower whose more than 100,000 records on prominent clients of HSBC Private Bank (Suisse) SA led to probes in several countries of alleged tax-dodging by wealthy people around the world.

The data, allegedly detailing accounts worth $100 billion, first emerged in press reports in 2008. Falciani then released the information to French tax authorities, who later shared it with Spain and other governments.

Falciani moved to Spain and cooperated with prosecutors there in some of the probes. He was arrested in Barcelona in 2012, but Spain's National Court denied a Swiss request to extradite him on the grounds that breaking secrecy laws was not subject to prosecution in Spain.

His arrest in Madrid came nearly two years after Falciani's conviction was made final by Swiss courts.

It also coincided with Spain's efforts to seek extradition from Switzerland of Marta Rovira, a prominent Catalan separatist politician considered key in the Spanish region's illegal independence bid. Swiss authorities have not ruled yet on whether she should be extradited.

Spanish Minister of Justice Rafael Catala said the government had no involvement in Falciani's arrest and that no connection should be made between the two cases.

"These are judicial cases sought in the realm of international cooperation," Catala said Thursday. "We shouldn't see into it more than that."

Confusion surrounded the origins of the new effort to bring Falciani into custody.

Lawyer Marc Henzelin, who represents Falciani in Switzerland, and Spanish police said Swiss authorities asked Spanish counterparts in mid-March to arrest the IT specialist.

But Folco Galli, a spokesman for Switzerland's Federal Office of Justice, said it was "completely wrong" to suggest that Swiss authorities have been seeking Falciani's arrest only since March.

He said Falciani has been listed since 2009 as a wanted person for extradition under the Schengen zone's notification system — first on the basis of an arrest warrant issued by a Swiss prosecutor that year, then based on the 2015 criminal convictions.

"On March 19, Spanish authorities told us that the search for Mr. Falciani was valid for Spanish territory," said Galli. He declined to say whether such a step was unusual, because cooperation on such cases between states is confidential.

The Federal office of Justice said that, following word of Falciani's arrest, Swiss authorities made a fresh formal extradition request Thursday.

Henzelin, Falciani's lawyer, noted a "hypothesis" among some, which he could not confirm, that the arrest could be connected to a "sort of deal" between Spain and Switzerland over a transfer of Catalan separatists who are wanted by Spanish authorities.

"I'm not able to verify that, but frankly if it were the case, I would consider that rather odious," said Henzelin. "It's not in the tradition of Swiss justice to do such a kind of bargaining. It seems to me it's more the habit of Russia and countries like that."

X.net, a platform of internet activists that cooperated with Falciani in some investigations into corruption and tax evasion, criticized the arrest.

"Whistleblowers of corruption used as exchange currency. What justice is this?" the platform wondered in a tweet.

Spanish defense lawyer Manuel Olle said the country's National Court had already ruled out Falciani's extradition in 2013.

"He can't be tried twice," Olle said, adding that he believed that the case was politically motivated.

Herve Falciani leaked documents allegedly indicating that HSBC's Swiss private banking arm helped more than 120,000 clients to hide 180.6 billion euros ($222 billion) from tax authorities https://t.co/nnuinM56CG

— AFP news agency (@AFP) April 5, 2018

HSBC leaker Herve Falciani detained in Spain: police

Yahoo – AFP,  April 4, 2018

Herve Falciani, the former HSBC employee whose disclosures uncorked the
 "Swissleaks" scandal on bank-supported tax evasion, has been detained in
Spain (AFP Photo/Jean-Philippe KSIAZEK)

Madrid (AFP) - Spanish police on Wednesday detained Herve Falciani, a former computer analyst at the Swiss branch of HSBC who leaked documents alleging the bank helped clients evade millions of dollars in taxes, a police source said.

"He was arrested in Madrid, in the street on the way to a conference," a top police official told AFP, adding the arrest was made at the request of Switzerland, which is seeking his extradition.

A Swiss court in 2015 convicted Falciani, a French-Italian national, of aggravated industrial espionage and handed him a five-year prison sentence.

He did not attend his trial and has avoided Switzerland since.

Falciani leaked a cache of documents allegedly indicating that HSBC's Swiss private banking arm helped more than 120,000 clients to hide 180.6 billion euros ($222 billion) from tax authorities, sparking the so-called "Swissleaks" scandal.

While he is widely viewed as a whistleblower and hailed as a hero in countries where his leaked information is helping catch tax cheats, Swiss authorities prosecuted him for data theft, industrial espionage, and violating the country's long-cherished banking secrecy laws.

Falciani became an IT worker for HSBC in 2000 and moved to the bank's offices in Geneva in 2006.

The so-called "Snowden of tax evasion" and "the man who terrifies the rich" then obtained access to a massive database of encrypted customer information.

He took the client list in 2007 and went to Lebanon with his mistress the next year planning to sell the data. Swiss authorities described it as "cashing in".

Yet suspicious bankers in Lebanon were not interested in buying the dubiously sourced client list and at least one tipped off their Swiss counterparts to Falciani's activities.

Falciani then got in contact with European fiscal authorities and began passing them the pilfered information, which prompted numerous tax evasion audits.

Falciani rejects that he was only seeking financial gain, insisting he had wanted to expose how banks support tax evasion and money laundering.

He travelled to Spain by boat in July 2012 and was arrested in Barcelona on an international warrant seeking his extradition to Switzerland.

Falciani then spent a couple of months in a Spanish prison.

In 2013, Spain's High Court ruled against extraditing Falciani on the grounds that the charges he faced in Switzerland are not considered crimes under Spanish law.

HSBC to pay 300 mn euros to avoid French tax fraud trial

Yahoo – AFP, November 14, 2017

HSBC Private Bank, a Swiss unit of banking giant HSBC, has agreed to pay 300 million
 euros ($352 million) to avoid going to trial in France for enabling tax fraud. (AFP Photo/
FABRICE COFFRINI)

Paris (AFP) - HSBC Private Bank, a Swiss unit of banking giant HSBC, has agreed to pay 300 million euros ($352 million) to avoid going to trial in France for enabling tax fraud, prosecutors said Tuesday.

HSBC was accused last year of helping French clients to hide at least 1.67 billion euros from the tax authorities, according to a source close to the probe.

The deal struck between the financial crime prosecutor's office and the bank is a first in France under a new procedure that allows companies under suspicion of corruption or dissimulation of tax fraud to negotiate a fine to stop a case from going to trial.

The deal does not include a guilty plea and French prosecutors have now dropped the case against HSBC Holdings.

Investigators believe that HSBC's private banking division offered its customers several ways of hiding assets from the French taxman, notably via the use of offshore tax havens.

The banking giant was at first accused of failing in its supervisory role over its private banking division, but further investigation led to suspicions that HSBC "participated actively in the fraudulent practices", the source close to the investigation said.

The probe named the former chief executive of the bank's Swiss private banking arm, Peter Braunwalder, and another executive, Judah Elmaleh.

The case began when French authorities in late 2008 received files stolen by Herve Falciani, a former HSBC employee, whose disclosures sparked the so-called "Swissleaks" scandal on bank-supported tax evasion.

The French-Italian national -- dubbed by some media as "The Edward Snowden of banking" -- leaked a cache of documents allegedly indicating that HSBC helped more than 120,000 clients of a number of nationalities to hide 180.6 billion euros from tax authorities between November 2006 and March 2007.

He was sentenced in absentia in November in Switzerland to five years in prison. The leaked files led to investigations by tax authorities in several European countries including, in addition to France, Spain and Belgium.

Assange claims victory after Sweden drops rape probe

Yahoo – AFP, May 19, 2017

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange speaks on the balcony of the Embassy of
Ecuador in London on May 19, 2017 (AFP Photo/Daniel LEAL-OLIVAS)

London (AFP) - Julian Assange claimed victory Friday after Swedish prosecutors dropped a seven-year rape allegation against the WikiLeaks founder, but insisted the "proper war" over his future was only just beginning.

Assange gave a clenched fist salute as he stepped into the daylight on the balcony of Ecuador's London embassy, where he has been holed up since 2012.

But the 45-year-old Australian said the road was "far from over" and declined to reveal whether he would leave the embassy after five years cooped up inside.

British police would arrest him immediately for breaching earlier bail conditions if he left the embassy, while US authorities have warned they regard WikiLeaks as a "hostile intelligence service".

"Today is an important victory," Assange told reporters and a small band of supporters crowded around the tiny balcony, after emerging wearing a black shirt and jacket.

"But it by no means erases seven years of detention without charge. In prison, under house arrest and almost five years here in this embassy without sunlight.

"That is not something that I can forgive. It is not something that I can forget."

Uncertain future

Earlier in Stockholm, Marianne Ny, Sweden's director of public prosecutions, said the rape investigation had been dropped because there was "no reason to believe that the decision to surrender him to Sweden can be executed in the foreseeable future".

"It is no longer proportionate to maintain the arrest of Julian Assange in his absence," she said.

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange raises his fist prior to addressing the media on

 the balcony of the Embassy of Ecuador in London on May 19, 2017 (AFP Photo/

Justin TALLIS)

Despite the probe in Sweden being dropped, Assange would still face arrest if he set foot outside the embassy, a flat located just behind the plush Harrods emporium.

Assange jumped British bail by entering the embassy and claiming asylum, saying he feared he would eventually be extradited to the United States.

US justice authorities have never confirmed that they have Assange under investigation or are seeking his extradition.

But US Attorney General Jeff Sessions said last month that "we will seek to put some people in jail", when asked if arresting Assange was a "priority" for Washington.

US prosecutors have been drafting a memo that looks at charges against Assange and WikiLeaks members that possibly include conspiracy, theft of government property and violations of the Espionage Act, according to The Washington Post.

US President Donald Trump's administration has put heat on WikiLeaks after it embarrassed the Central Intelligence Agency in March by releasing files and computer code from the spy agency's top-secret hacking operations.

"While today was an important victory and an important vindication, the road is far from over. The war, the proper war is just commencing," Assange said.

He said his lawyers were in touch with the British authorities and hoped to begin a dialogue about the "best way forward".

And the former computer hacker said that despite the "extremely threatening remarks" emanating from Washington, he was "always ready to engage with the Department of Justice".

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange speaks on the balcony of the Embassy 

of Ecuador in London on May 19, 2017 (AFP Photo/Adrian DENNIS)

The department said Friday it had no comment "at this point" on Assange.

Asked if London would now support a request to extradite Assange to the United States, British Prime Minister Theresa May said: "We look at extradition requests on a case-by-case basis."

Assange's Swedish lawyer, Per Samuelsson, said his client plans to move to Ecuador because "it's the only nation where he is safe".

Decision a 'scandal'

In Sweden, Assange's accuser was left stunned by the prosecutors' decision.

"It is a scandal that a suspected rapist can escape justice and thereby avoid the courts," her lawyer, Elisabeth Fritz, told AFP in an email.

"My client is shocked and no decision to (end the case) can make her change (her mind) that Assange exposed her to rape," she said.

The accusation against Assange dates from August 2010 when the alleged victim, who says she met him at a WikiLeaks conference in Stockholm a few days earlier, filed a complaint.

She accused him of having sex with her -- as she slept -- without using a condom despite repeatedly having denied him unprotected sex.

Assange always denied the allegations, which he feared would lead to him being extradited to the United States and facing trial over the leak of hundreds of thousands of secret US military and diplomatic documents in 2010, which brought WikiLeaks to prominence.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange addresses the media holding a printed report

of the judgement of the UN's Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on his case

 from the balcony of the Ecuadorian embassy in central London on February 5,

2016 (AFP Photo/Niklas Halle'n)

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Journalists acquitted, Spanish prelate guilty in Vatileaks

Yahoo – AFP, Ella Ide, July 7, 2016

Italian journalists Gianluigi Nuzzi (C) and Emiliano Fittipaldi (R) give a press
 conference on July 7, 2016 in Vatican City after a verdict in the "Vatileaks" trial
(AFP Photo/Gabriel Bouys)

Vatican City (AFP) - Two investigative journalists accused of publishing stolen papers which exposed scandal in the Vatican were acquitted Thursday, while a whistle-blowing Spanish prelate was sentenced to jail time in the Vatileaks trial.

The drama of sex, greed and press freedom which had gripped the tiny city state for months peaked with the surprise verdict given by presiding judge Giuseppe Dalla Torre "in the name of his Holiness Pope Francis".

Italians Gianluigi Nuzzi and Emiliano Fittipaldi, who had published books based on the documents at the heart of the trial, were not considered to have committed a crime on Vatican territory and therefore were outside the judges' territorial authority.

Francesca Chaouqui leaves Vatican

 City on July 7, 2016 after the verdict in

 the "Vatileaks" trial (AFP Photo/

Gabriel Bouys)

Spanish prelate Lucio Vallejo Balda, who had admitted to leaking secret papers, was handed a 18-month prison sentence while his assistant, who prosecutors admitted had had little to do with the affair, was acquitted.

Italian PR expert Francesca Chaouqui, who had been involved in a review of Vatican finances and is accused of both "inspiring" and being ultimately responsibility for the leaks, was given a 10-month suspended sentence.

Dalla Torre said there was no evidence Chaouqui had stolen documents, though she had played a role in the leaks.

Chaouqui told the media she had been punished for serving as a go-between between Balda and the journalists, but was relieved the pope would now know she was not guilty of whistle blowing, describing her acquittal on that count as "my biggest victory".

Balda and Chaouqui have three days to appeal the verdict.

'Tensions, polemics in Vatican'

The trial "had to be done, to show the Vatican's determination to fight the existence and consequences of the tensions and internal polemics of the Vatican," spokesman Federico Lombardi said.

The leaks, he said, had "negative consequences on public opinion". But fighting them had "not put freedom of the press on trial".

Nuzzi told journalists outside the courthouse that it was "a historic day. This is the base of democracy, freedom of the press".

Pope Francis (left) greets his predecessor Benedict XVI before a 2015 ceremony

at the Vatican (AFP Photo)

Fittipaldi described the trial as "Kafkaesque" but said in its ruling the Vatican had been "courageous", adding that he had not expected to be acquitted.

"Journalists have to do their job without being afraid of power. Here secrets were revealed that they wanted to cover up, but revealing them is just what we must do," he said.

The scandal, the second to hit the Vatican, rocked the Roman Catholic Church with its leaked accounts of theft and greed, as well as publication of secret recordings of Pope Francis's private conversations.

Among the most striking revelations in the books was that less than 20 percent of donations made by believers around the world under the Peter's Pence scheme ended up being spent on good works.

The rest was swallowed up by the Vatican bureaucracy, reportedly partly helping to subsidise the luxurious lifestyles of certain cardinals.

Parties and plots

The trial then ballooned into steamier fare, as Spanish monsignor Vallejo Balda and PR expert Chaouqui turned on each other in the witness box.

Details emerged of alleged sexual affairs, glitzy parties and secret plots in the corridors of power.

The prosecution had called for prison sentences for all, apart from Fittipaldi, saying he should be acquitted for lack of evidence.

Pope Francis, flanked by Vatican's spokesman Federico Lombardi, right, arrives 

to greet journalists on board the airplane on his way to Yerevan, Armenia, Friday, 

June 24, 2016. Pope Francis will be in Armenia for a three-day visit. (AP Photo/

Andrew Medichini)

Chaouqui, who gave birth three weeks ago, had made an emotional plea to the court earlier Thursday, saying she could not bear spending the first few years of her son's life behind bars.

Vallejo Balda had admitted to leaking the classified papers but said he had done so under pressure from Chaouqui, with whom he claimed to have a "compromising" relationship.

He also claimed he had been blackmailed by a woman he believed to have links to Italian secret services and other contacts in a "dangerous world".

All five were prosecuted under draconian anti-leaks legislation, rushed onto the Vatican statute book in 2013 as a result of the fallout from the first Vatileaks scandal, which centred on secrets divulged by the butler of now-retired pope Benedict XVI.

Butler Paolo Gabriele was sentenced to 18 months jail time in 2012 after stealing documents in a bid to "fight evil and corruption", and was pardoned by Benedict three months later and banished from the Vatican forever.

Extradition lawyer Alessandro Tirelli said finding the journalists guilty would likely have led to the Vatican requesting they be extradited from Italy, sparking "a polemical wave in the country of the sort the pope hopes to avoid".

He said he thought it probable Balda and Chaouqui would be pardoned by Francis and exiled from the tiny state.

Iceland premier resigns in Panama Papers scandal

Yahoo – AFP, Hugues Honore with David Williams in Paris, April 5, 2016

Iceland Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson had been under pressure to
 resign since leaked financial documents showed he and his wife owned an offshore
company in the British Virgin Islands (AFP Photo/Jonathan Nackstrand)

Reykjavik (AFP) - Iceland's prime minister resigned Tuesday, becoming the first political victim of a mushrooming worldwide scandal over hidden offshore financial dealings exposed in the so-called Panama Papers.

Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson was the biggest casualty of a worldwide media probe into 11.5 million leaked documents that purportedly reveal the offshore financial activities of 140 political figures, including 12 current or former heads of state.

"The prime minister told (his party's) parliamentary group meeting that he would step down as prime minister and I will take over," the Progressive Party's deputy leader Sigurdur Ingi Johannsson told a live broadcast.

A series of other leaders and stars fingered in the leaked papers have hit back at the allegations, denying any wrongdoing despite the international furore.

Those named include Russian President Vladimir Putin's associates, Chinese President Xi Jinping's relatives, British Prime Minister David Cameron's later father and celebrities such as Argentine footballing great Lionel Messi.

Iceland's leader had been under immense pressure after the papers, leaked from a Panamanian law firm, appeared to show that he and his wife Anna Sigurlaug Palsdottir owned an offshore company in the British Virgin Islands and placed millions of dollars there.

Though the prime minister denied ever hiding money abroad, pressure on his government had mounted, with egg-throwing protesters gathering in the streets Monday and fresh demonstrations planned Tuesday.

Graphic on the political fall-out of the Panama papers leak in Iceland where huge

 crowds poured into the streets of the capital Monday calling for the prime minister 

to resign (AFP Photo/John SAEKI, Adrian LEUNG)

'Groundless allegations'

The vast stash of records from Panamanian legal firm Mossack Fonseca was obtained from an anonymous source by German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung and shared with more than 100 media groups by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).

The network of journalists published their first findings Sunday after a year-long probe.

Offshore financial dealings are not illegal in themselves, though they may be used to hide assets from tax authorities, launder the proceeds of criminal activities or conceal misappropriated or politically inconvenient wealth.

In Beijing, there was no official reaction to ICIJ allegations that eight current or former members of the ruling party's most powerful body concealed their fortunes through offshore havens, as well as relatives of Xi Jinping, who has overseen a much-publicised anti-corruption drive.

Asked whether China would investigate those named in the reports, however, foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei said: "For such groundless accusations, I have no comment."

The Kremlin suggested a US plot after the leaks put a close friend of Putin's at the top of an offshore empire worth more than $2 billion.

"Putin, Russia, our country, our stability and the upcoming elections are the main target, specifically to destabilise the situation," said a Kremlin spokesman, claiming many of the journalists were former officers from the US state department, the CIA and special services.

Rich must pay taxes too

Messi's family denied any wrongdoing after the footballer and his father were named as owners of a Panama company that had not previously been disclosed during a Spanish probe into their tax affairs.

"The Panama company to which they refer to is a totally inactive company that never had any funds or any open current accounts," the Messi family said in a statement Monday.

Australia, France and the Netherlands have announced investigations into revelations contained in the papers. A judicial source said Spain had opened a money-laundering probe into the law firm.

"We need to make sure that not just ordinary citizens pay their taxes but also people who have a lot of money, who earn a lot of money, pay their taxes where they make that money and don't hide the money," visiting European Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans told reporters Tuesday in the Polish capital Warsaw.

Panama has pledged to identify whether any crimes had been committed and any financial damages should be awarded.

But France's Finance Minister Michel Sapin said his country would put Panama back on its list of countries that do not cooperate in efforts to track down tax dodgers following the revelations.

Latest allegations

Among the latest allegations of the Panama Papers investigations:

- A North Korean front company used to help fund the country's nuclear weapons programme, Pyongyang-based DCB Finance Ltd, was among Mossack Fonseca's clients, according to the BBC and The Guardian.

British Prime Minister David Cameron

 Cameron's Downing Street office insisted

 it was a "private matter" whether the family

 still had funds in offshore investments 

(AFP Photo/Alex Wong)

-- Prime Minister David Cameron's father ran an offshore fund that paid no tax in Britain for 30 years, according to the Panama Papers probe. Cameron's Downing Street office insisted it was a "private matter" although a government source later told AFP that the prime minister himself did not have any such funds.

-- Aides to French far-right leader Marine Le Pen put in place a "sophisticated offshore system" to hide money, according to Le Monde newspaper.

-- Syria used Mossack Fonseca to create shell companies to help it break international sanctions and fund its war effort, the French paper said.

The papers, from around 214,000 offshore entities covering almost 40 years, also name the president of Ukraine and the king of Saudi Arabia. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko denied any wrongdoing, but he may face an attempt to impeach him.

One of the Panama law firm's founders, Ramon Fonseca, told AFP the leaks themselves were "a crime, a felony" and "an attack on Panama".

Mossack Fonseca is subject to investigations in Germany and also in Brazil, where it is part of a huge money laundering probe that has threatened to topple the current government.

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President Obama Just Took a Major Step in Response to the Panama Papers - New
Switzerland,Singapo rejoin clampdown on bank secrecy (Update)

Assange hails 'victory' from embassy balcony after UN panel ruling

Yahoo – AFP, Jacques Klopp, February 5, 2016

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange addresses the media holding a printed report 

of the judgement of the UN's Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on his case

 from the balcony of the Ecuadorian embassy in central London on February 5, 

2016 (AFP Photo/Niklas Halle'n)

London (AFP) - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Friday urged Britain to let him walk free from Ecuador's London embassy after a UN panel found that the anti-secrecy campaigner who faces a rape allegation in Sweden was "arbitrarily detained."

Speaking to a handful of supporters and a media scrum in a rare appearance from the balcony of the embassy where he took refuge nearly four years ago, Assange hailed a "victory of historical importance".

"How sweet it is! This is a victory that cannot be denied," he proclaimed, waving a hard copy of the legal opinion and often seeming emotional.

Assange has refused to go to Sweden for questioning fearing deportation to the US over WikiLeaks' release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

A look back at the key dates in the life of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

(AFP Photo/Kun Tian, Thomas Saint-Cricq)

Earlier, the 44-year-old Australian told journalists via video link that it was "now the task of the states of Sweden and the United Kingdom as a whole to implement the verdict".

The UN panel said Assange's detention should end and that he should be able to claim compensation from Britain and Sweden.

But both countries quickly dismissed the non-binding legal opinion, with Britain's Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond calling it "ridiculous".

Assange walked into the embassy in June 2012 to avoid the threat of arrest and extradition to Sweden, where he still faces a rape allegation.

He has lived there ever since in a small office room with a bed, computer, sun lamp, treadmill and access to a small balcony decorated with Ecuador's flag.

Ecuador's Foreign Minister Ricardo 

Patino speaks during a press conference

 in Quito on February 5, 2016 (AFP Photo/

Rodrigo Buendia)

In a statement, the panel said it had adopted an opinion that considered Assange "arbitrarily detained by the governments of Sweden and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland."

It added: "The working group also considered that the detention should be brought to an end and that Mr Assange should be afforded the right to compensation."

Fears of imprisonment

Britain and Sweden sharply condemned the panel's findings and said they would change nothing.

Hammond called Assange "a fugitive from justice."

"This is frankly a ridiculous finding by the working group and we reject it," the foreign secretary added.

Sweden's foreign ministry said that it "does not agree" with the assessment.

"Mr Assange is free to leave the embassy at any point and Swedish authorities have no control over his decision to stay at the embassy," the ministry added.

Only three of the five members of the UN panel supported the opinion -- one recused herself because she is Australian, like Assange, and another member disagreed.

British designer Vivienne Westwood displays a British passport after arriving to visit

 Wikileaks founder Julian Assange at Ecuador's embassy in central London, on

February 4, 2016 (AFP Photo/Chris Ratcliffe)

Christophe Peschoux, the working group's secretary, said at a briefing in Geneva that Britain and Sweden had two months to submit new information to force a review, and Britain says it will contest the opinion.

Ecuador's Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino said it was "time for both governments... to allow Julian Assange his freedom."

Swedish authorities want to speak to Assange about a rape allegation whose statute of limitations does not expire until 2020.

Elizabeth Fritz, the lawyer for the woman who has accused Assange, criticised the panel's comments.

"That a man who is wanted on an arrest warrant for rape should be awarded compensation for intentionally hiding from the judicial system for more than five years is offensive to my client," she said.

Swedish judicial authorities said last month that Ecuador had refused its request to let a Swedish prosecutor question Assange because Quito wanted an Ecuadorean prosecutor to do the questioning.

British Foreign Secretary Philip

Hammond described the UN panels'

decision on Wikileaks founder Julian 

Assange as "ridiculous" as he 

met journalists in London, on 

February 5, 2016 (AFP Photo/

Niklas Halle'n)

'Publicity stunt'

Assange fears that if he went to Sweden for questioning, he could then be sent to the US and face prison. 

WikiLeaks' activities -- including the release of 500,000 secret military files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq -- have infuriated the US.

The main source of the leaks, US Army soldier Chelsea Manning, was sentenced to 35 years in prison for breaches of the Espionage Act.

A hero to supporters and a dangerous egocentric to detractors, the computer programmer and hacker, whose celebrity fans include fashion designer Vivienne Westwood and singer Lady Gaga, founded WikiLeaks in 2006 and has been portrayed in two movies in recent years.

Britain spent over £10 million (12 million euros, $15 million) maintaining a 24-hour guard outside the embassy to immediately arrest Assange if he set foot on British soil, but withdrew it last year.

The Assange case has polarised opinion in Britain and there were many criticisms of his conduct Friday.

The Guardian newspaper, which has in the past worked with WikiLeaks to publish secret documents, used an editorial to condemn the latest developments as "a publicity stunt."

Julian #Assange should be able to walk free and claim compensation, UN panel says: https://t.co/3K7c4d7XKF pic.twitter.com/9WcaQsz7lw

— AFP London (@afplondon) February 5, 2016

Related Article:

Timeline: Julian Assange's story so far

Britain's Lord Sewel resigns after cocaine and prostitutes scandal

Yahoo – AFP, Katherine Haddon, 28 July 2015

Lord John Sewel apologised after pictures in The Sun newspaper appeared to 

show him snorting cocaine with prostitutes (AFP Photo)

London (AFP) - A British peer who was in charge of lawmakers' ethics quit the House of Lords on Tuesday after allegedly snorting cocaine off a prostitute's breasts, fuelling calls for reform of the unelected upper chamber.

Lord John Sewel, 69, apologised for the "pain and embarrassment" caused after the Rupert Murdoch-owned Sun newspaper published footage of him apparently taking drugs and wearing an orange bra and studded leather jacket as he chatted to two sex workers.

The images also showed him calling Prime Minister David Cameron "facile" and "superficial" and insulting several other senior politicians.

The scandal has prompted renewed calls
for reforms to slim down the House of 
Lords, made up of 783 peers (AFP Photo/
Toby Melville)

Scotland Yard has launched an investigation and raided Sewel's home at an exclusive block of flats near the Houses of Parliament on Monday night.

While reforming the House of Lords is not a priority for Cameron's centre-right government, the case has sparked calls for the chamber -- the world's largest legislative assembly outside China -- to be slimmed down.

"I have today written to the clerk of the parliaments terminating my membership of the House of Lords," Sewel, previously a deputy speaker of the Lords, said in a statement.

"I want to apologise for the pain and embarrassment I have caused."

The Sun on Tuesday quoted the escorts as saying he snorted up to eight lines of cocaine and described one of their sessions.

"He slipped into a woman's blue dress and applied lipstick and eyeliner to engage in depraved sex games too obscene to report in a family newspaper," the tabloid said.

'Bloated' House of Lords

The married 69-year-old, dubbed "Lord Sewer" by The Sun, quit his £82,525 (115,000 euro, $128,000) a year deputy speaker post overseeing the conduct of fellow peers when the scandal first broke Sunday.

He then announced Monday that he would take a leave of absence from the Lords but faced growing pressure to step down entirely.

Members of the Lords - mostly former ministers appointed by their own political

parties - can claim a £300 daily attendance allowance (AFP Photo/Justin Tallis)

Several British newspapers said Tuesday that the case showed changes were needed to the House of Lords, made up of 783 peers who can claim a £300 daily attendance allowance.

Most members of the Lords, which scrutinises and rubber stamps legislation, are former ministers appointed by their own political parties.

The Daily Mirror, The Sun's main tabloid rival, launched a campaign Tuesday to get rid of all unelected peers.

Meanwhile, The Times said the House of Lords was "bloated" and its numbers should be reduced.

"An unelected chamber with esoteric practices and a median age of about 70 cannot afford to enter the public consciousness only when its members are embroiled in scandal," it said in an editorial.

Cameron is expected to create a string of new peers from his Conservative party in the coming months to give him a majority in the upper chamber, making it easier for his government to pass legislation.

The prime minister reportedly ruled out sweeping reforms to the Lords on a visit to Singapore, saying there was "no point in trying that route again" after a failed bid in 2012 pushed by his former coalition partners the Liberal Democrats.

Ten members of the Lords have been temporarily suspended since 2009

for breaches including abusing the expenses system (AFP Photo/Leon Neal)

'Privileges of a peerage'

Leader of the House of Lords Baroness Tina Stowell acknowledged the importance of public perceptions of the chamber as she welcomed Sewel's resignation.

"For the House of Lords to earn the confidence of the public, all of us must respect the privileges that come with a peerage and recognise that, because we are unelected, it is especially important to meet the standards the public have a right to expect," she said.

Sewel is a former academic and local politician in northeast Scotland who was appointed as a junior agriculture minister in Tony Blair's centre-left Labour government in 1997.

He gave up the Labour whip in 2012 when he took on the job of overseeing the conduct of peers.

Ironically, Sewel oversaw the introduction of a new system under which peers can be forced out of the Lords for breaching a code of conduct. Previously, only the monarch could eject them.

Ten peers have been temporarily suspended since 2009 for breaches including abusing the expenses system and offering to lobby for private companies.

A British politician, Lord John Sewel, has resigned from the House of Lords after

 a newspaper published a video allegedly showing him using cocaine with prostitutes.

Sewel was in charge of standards in the upper chamber.

Related Articles:

British peer quits House of Lords amid drug and sex allegations


"Recalibration of Free Choice"–  Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Loose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth,  4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical)  8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.) - (Text version)

“…5 - Integrity That May Surprise…

The Unthinkable… Politics, A Review

Humans will begin to search for integrity and fairness and it's going to happen in the places you never expect. I said this last week, so this is a review. There'll come a time when you will demand this of your politics - fairness and integrity. So when the candidates start calling each other names, you will turn your back on them and they won't get any votes. They're going to get the point real fast, don't you think? How about that?

Let me give you another potential. This country that I sit in right now [USA] will set the mold for that particular attribute. I have no clock. Watch for the youngsters to set this in motion, and they will, for they are the voters of tomorrow and they do not want the energy of today. To some of them, it's so abominable they won't even register to vote in this energy. You're going to see this soon. That was number five.. ..."