Exactly. This is all about Assange not wanting to be questioned about sexual assault.

All this posturing about how the US wants him is a smoke screen - Ecuador has an extradition treaty with the US. Assange may be completely innocent: trying to desperately avoid being questioned about the alleged offences doesn't paint a great picture.

He presented himself for questioning before he left Sweden. They told him he was free to leave. My understanding is that also Sweden will sometimes conduct such questioning via remote video link, but they have declined to do that in this case. It's been well over a year, it's not like they couldn't charge him without questioning if they wanted to.

I'm not really sure what's going down here, except it seems the least likely possibility is that Sweden wants to give him a fair trial for the sex allegations.

Not only is it pretty suspicious that this rape charge should pop up at exactly the time of Assange's ascendency into persona non Guantanamo status, but it gets even fishier when you consider the nature of the accusation. The allegation is that his condom burst during intercourse and he did not stop - in other words it's one of the few crimes for which he cannot possibly have an alibi or a supporting witness or even physical evidence (ie. lack of physical harm).

Anyone who doesn't think the US government is behind this is living in cloud cuckoo land.

He's not even charged in Sweden. It's fairly obvious the Swedish angle is being used to get him in a country from which he can be extradicted to the US.

Because the UK never extradites anyone to the USA, especially their own citizens...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_McKinnon

Every time I hear this argument I don't know if to laugh or to cry.

Assange himself pointed out that it is much easier to be extradited to the US from the UK (which extradites to the US almost anyone for pretty much any reason) than from Sweden (that as far as i know very rarely if ever extradites to the US).

If he was really afraid of being extradited to the US, he would want to be in Sweden rather than in the UK.

But this is more palatable all round.

The UK can send him to Sweden, saying they complied with EU rules. The UK can then relax, and not deal with the wrath of Australia being pissed off - an ex-commonwealth country.

Once he's convicted in Sweden, he can serve the two-months or whatever. Then he can be extradited to the US. Sweden can relax - he's a convicted sex offender now, extradited from the UK. It's harder for him to get legal support in Sweden - he's English-speaking, as are the majority of his supporters.

And the US gets their man. No government wants some renegade out there leaking their secrets.

The UK and US will obviously have discussed his extradition. They've agreed to try the Swedish route first. It doesn't have a political cost for the UK government.

He's not charged with sexual assault (not yet, anyway). The warrant is to return him for questioning.

Nope, there is no charge, they just want to question him.

My mistake. In any event, this has nothing to do with the US government.