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Newspaper: Assange To Appear In Court Tuesday

Update at 7 p.m. ET: WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is now expected to appear in court Tuesday in connection with a sex-crime investigation in Sweden.

NPR's Philip Reeves is reporting that Britain's The Guardiannewspaper says Assange appears to be preparing to fight extradition to Sweden.

"His lawyer, Mark Stephens, says British police have made contact to say they'd received a new extradition request from Sweden," Reeves says. "He said arrangements were being made for a meeting between Assange and the police."

The WikiLeaks documents have deeply angered the U.S. and British governments. The Guardian is reporting that Assange is asking supporters to put up bail and surety that could exceed $300,000.

Our Original Post:

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange "tonight agreed to meet police in the U.K.," his lawyers tell The Guardian.

"We are negotiating a meeting with police," Jennifer, a "solicitor" with the firm representing Assange told the British news outlet.

Other news organizations, including the BBC and NBC, are also saying they've been told that by Assange's attorneys.

If the meeting does take place, the subject is not supposed to be the huge cache of U.S. diplomatic cables that WikiLeaks gave to the Guardian, The New York Timesand few other news organizations.

Rather, British police want to question him regarding a Swedish arrest warrant. Assange, a 39-year-old Australian, is wanted in Sweden for questioning about an alleged rape. He has denied any wrongdoing.

According to the BBC, "a fresh arrest warrant has been received in the U.K." for Assange.

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Mark Memmott is NPR's supervising senior editor for Standards & Practices. In that role, he's a resource for NPR's journalists – helping them raise the right questions as they do their work and uphold the organization's standards.