"Ecuador has been very clear" on Assange's asylum status, Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Jose Valencia told Spain's ABC newspaper on Thursday. "It is an issue that should be dealt with in the framework of international law by three parties: the British government, the Ecuadorian government and Assange's lawyers," the Foreign Minister said.
According to the top diplomat, the asylum agreement which was granted in its own time requires some sort of resolution, "because it cannot be an eternal asylum. But it's difficult to predict how long it will take to find a solution," he said.
Earlier, media reported that British and Ecuadorian officials had engaged in secret talks to expel Assange from its London embassy. In turn, Ecuadorian President Lenin Moreno said he would not discuss Assange's fate during his trip to the UK and Spain this week.
Julian Assange took refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2012 after being accused of sexual assault in Sweden. The whistleblower maintained that the charges against him were false, and that they served as an excuse to extradite him to the United States, where he is accused of espionage and of leaking thousands of classified documents related to US military operations.
Assange's internet connection was cut off in March, with a WikiLeaks adviser and Assange ally saying the move may have been connected with the activist's tweets about the Skripal poisoning case.
