Assange will speak during UN gathering from Ecuadorian Embassy in London

WikiLeaks' creator Julian Assange is expected to speak publicly via satellite from London as the world's leaders are gathered at the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
Assange -- who has been holed up at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since June -- will "debate the legitimacy and applicability" ofhis request for asylum in Ecuador "from a legal and a human rights

perspective," according to RT, the Russian television channel that will transmit his live message.Assange has a talk show on the state-funded Russian channel.For much of 2011 until June, Assange had been under house arrest in Britain while he filed appeal after appealagainst his extradition from the United Kingdom to Sweden. Sweden has said it wants to question Assange on allegations that he sexually assaulted a woman there.Assange has not been charged with a crime.Ecuador's Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino is expected to explain on Wednesday's video conference why his country granted asylum to the WikiLeaks founder, according to noted American attorney Baher Azmy.Azmy, the legal director of New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, will moderate the conference. The center is part of the U.S. legal team representing Assange.

"Our goal is to educate the public and members of the U.N. about the legal jeopardy Mr. Assange is facing," Azmy said.Ecuador granted Assange asylum in August, but he cannot leave its embassy in London. Otherwise he'll likely be arrested by British authorities. The embassy is a sovereign space that authorities from other countries cannot encroach. In August a London policeman was photographed carrying an arrest plan for Assange.

Assange has claimed that the sex allegations are false, a ruse to get him to Sweden which he believes will, in turn, extradite him to the United States.Several U.S. officials have made it clear they feel Assange violated the law by publishing in 2010 and 2011 a trove of classified war documents and diplomatic cables."We want to explain the jeopardy Assange is facing if he is transferred to the United States," Azmy said."If he were, we have information that he and other WikiLeaks employees would likely be prosecuted under the Espionage Act of 1917," he said. "We don't know the details of the potential indictment, but we do know there has been an ongoing, large-scale investigation [in the United States] of Assange.

"Assange isn't worried about the Swedish criminal process, Azmy said, and the WikiLeaks frontman wants to make that clear."We're asking that if Assange is transferred to Sweden, then the courts will agree not to transfer him to the U.S.," Azmy said. "Based on how Bradley Manning has been treated, we have every reason to be concerned that Assange would be subject to brutal and inhumane treatment."