British government's intercept intelligence agency GCHQ is facing embarrassing revelations about internal correspondence in which Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has been discussed.
The government eavesdropping agency apparently speculated that he is being framed by Swedish authorities seeking his extradition on rape allegations.
According to the Guardian, the records were revealed by Assange himself in an interview with Spanish television programme Salvados in which he explained that an official request for information gave him access to instant messages that remained unclassified by GCHQ.
The messages appear to contain speculation and chatter between GCHQ employees, but Assange gave little further explanation about exactly who they came from.
The WikiLeaks founder, who has spent the past 11 months in the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid arrest and extradition to Sweden, claimed GCHQ had been unaware that it might have anything on him that was not classified.
The Cheltenham-based agency confirmed that GCHQ responded formally to the subject who made the request.
On its website, the agency said that as one of the UK's intelligence and security agencies, they gather and analyse digital and electronic signals from many channels, from all corners of the world, the report added.