WikiLeaks' Assange Offered Residency in Ecuador

Now that WikiLeaks from U.S. diplomatic cables, the international political community is calling for someone's head. But amid the global backlash, WikiLeaks head Julian Assange has been offered residency in Ecuador, the BBC reports.

"We are open to giving [Assange] residency in Ecuador, without any problem and without any conditions," Kintto Lucas, the country's Deputy Foreign Minister, said in a statement. "We are going to try and invite him to Ecuador to freely present, not only via the Internet, but also through different public forums, the information and documentation that he has."

Lucas said he's disturbed by the U.S. activities disclosed in the most recent information leak. According to WikiLeaks, more than 1,600 of the cables originated in the Ecuadorian capital of Quito, although they have not yet been released. There are also cables that originated in other South American countries, including Brazil.

"We think it would be important not only to converse with him but also to listen to him," Lucas said of Assange.

Ecuador's invitation could be a welcome offer for the Australian-born Assange, who was denied residency in Sweden earlier this year. Assange is in Sweden for the second time in 2010.

On Monday, the Australian attorney general's office announced that it has "established a whole-of-government taskforce to look at [Wikileaks] and to obviously go through each and every incident to see what impact it may have and what action should appropriately be taken to firstly reduce any impact."

But when asked if Australia would deny Assange entry into the country or revoke his passport, the AG's office said "we're waiting for advice from the agencies as to appropriate course of actions that may be taken in response."

NPR said WikiLeaks is now the subject of a Justice Department criminal investigation. The State Department and the White House have also criticized the leak.

"The United States strongly condemns the illegal disclosure of classified information," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton . "We are taking aggressive steps to hold responsible those who stole this information. I have directed that specific actions be taken at the State Department, in addition to new security safeguards at the Department of Defense and elsewhere to protect State Department information so that this kind of bread cannot and does not ever happen again."

Clinton's statement was also confirmed by Attorney General Eric Holder.

"To the extent that we can find anybody who was involved in the breaking of American law and has put at risk the assets and the people I have described, they will be held responsible," Holder told NPR.

WikiLeaks responded to Clinton's statement with a tweet from the @WikiLeaks feed inviting people to donate to the organization. The group also tweeted a link to an Ottawa Citizen story about Ecuador's offer.