Metropolitan Police announced that police guards from outside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where Wikileaks founder Julian Assange staying, were removed on Monday.

The Australian Wikileaks founder has been living in the embassy for 40 months since he has sought refuge since June 2012 to avoid extradition to Sweden.

Since his entrance to the embassy, the Metropolitan Police Services (MPS) has maintained a police presence around the embassy in Knightsbridge central London.

The Metropolitan Police said on Monday that "the operation to arrest Julian Assange does however continue and should he leave the embassy the MPS will make every effort to arrest him."

"However it is no longer proportionate to commit officers to a permanent presence," it said, but MPS didn't reveal what form its continuing operation would take or the resourcing implications surrounding it.

Police said a significant amount of time has passed since Assange entered the embassy, and despite the efforts of many people there is no imminent prospect of a diplomatic or legal resolution to this issue.

"The MPS has to balance the interests of justice in this case with the ongoing risks to the safety of Londoners and all those we protect, investigating crime and arresting offenders wanted for serious offences, in deciding what a proportionate response is," it said.

It claimed that MPS resources are finite, as so many different criminal and threats to the city it needed. Therefore, the current deployment of officers is no longer believed proportionate.

Local media reported that the 24-hour guard outside the Ecuadorian Embassy had cost at least 11 million pounds (about 16.8 million U.S. dollars) in the past few years.

Kristin Hrafnsson, spokesperson for Wikileaks, said he did not know the reason of the remove of guards, and the action didn't change the situation. Endit

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