WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was on Monday denied a permit he had applied for to live and work in Sweden, an official of the Swedish Migration Board told AFP. "We have decided not to grant him a residence permit," said Gunilla Wikstroem, who is in charge of his case.
"He did not fulfil the requirements," she said, refusing to give more details for confidentiality reasons. The Australian founder of the whistleblowing website applied to the Swedish Migration Board for a residence permit on August 18. Some of the Wikileaks servers are situated in the Scandinavian country.
Two days after he filed his application, media revealed two women had reported him to police for rape and molestation. Assange is still under investigation in Sweden, but the probe did not bar him from leaving the country. When contacted by AFP Monday, an Icelandic spokesman for Wikileaks, Kristinn Hrafnsson, refused to reveal Assange's whereabouts. His last public appearance was in London, when he spoke publicly at City University on September 30. Wikileaks is imminently expected to release some 400,000 secret military reports on the US-led Iraq war.