WikiLeaks to halt operations,focus on fundraising: Assange

Wikileaks may be weeks away from collapse,the organisations leader warned

Wikileaks whose spectacular publication of classified data shook world capitals and exposed the inner workings of international diplomacy may be weeks away from collapse,the organisations leader warned Monday.

Although its attention-grabbing leaks spread outrage and embarrassment across military and diplomatic circles,WikiLeaks inability to shake the restrictions imposed by US financial companies may prove its undoing.

If WikiLeaks does not find a way to remove this blockade we will simply not be able to continue by the turn of the new year, founder Julian Assange told journalists at Londons Frontline Club. If we dont knock down the blockade we simply will not be able to continue.

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As an emergency measure,Assange said his group would cease what he called publication operations to focus its energy on fundraising. He added that WikiLeaks which he said had about 20 employees needs an additional $3.5 million to keep it going into 2013.

WikiLeaks published a massive trove of 2,50,000 US State Department cables late last year which resulted in financial screws being tightened against them.

One after the other,MasterCard,Visa,PayPal and Western Union stopped processing donations to WikiLeaks,starving the organisation of cash as it was coming under intense political,financial and legal pressure. Assange said Monday that the restrictions imposed in early December had cut off some 95 per cent of the money he thinks his organisation could have received.

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