Julian Assange is concerned not about any proceedings in Sweden as such, but believe that his deportation to Sweden could lead to politically motivated deportation to the United States, where he could face severe penalties, up to the death sentence, for his activities related to WikiLeaks. On 16 August 2012, Foreign Minister Patiño announced that Ecuador was granting Assange political asylum because of the threat represented by the United States secret investigation against him and several calls for assassination from many American politicians. In its formal statement, Ecuador reasoned that "as a consequence of [Assange's] determined defense to freedom of expression and
UK–US extradition treaty of 2003 about the level of proof required being less to extradite from the UK to the US rather than vice versa. Among other provisions Part 2 of the Act: Extradition to category 2 territories (non-European Arrest warrant territories) removed the requirement on the USA to provide "prima facie" evidence in extraditions from the UK, requiring instead only "reasonable suspicion". This was necessary to redress the previous imbalance against the USA under the 1870 Act, as the UK did not have to provide the more onerous "prima facie" evidence to extradite from the USA. The requirement for the UK is to show