Swedes on defensive over rape allegation

They insisted they had made no mistakes in issuing an arrest warrant and withdrawing it less than a day later.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said his group had been damaged.

The Swedish Prosecution Authority said an "on-call" prosecutor issued an arrest warrant for Mr Assange late on Friday only to see it revoked the next day by a higher-ranking prosecutor, who found no grounds to suspect him of rape.

"The prosecutor who took over the case yesterday had more information, and that is why she made a different assessment than the on-call prosecutor," said Karin Rosander, a spokeswoman for the authority.

She declined to specify what the new material was, but said there was "absolutely nothing" that suggested errors had been made by either prosecutor.

Mr Assange was in Sweden last week seeking legal protection for the website, which angered the US administration by publishing thousands of leaked documents about US military activities in Iraq and Afghanistan.

WikiLeaks is preparing to release a fresh batch of classified US documents from the Afghan war.

Mr Assange, an Australian, remains under suspicion of a lesser crime of molestation, which would not lead to an arrest warrant. Molestation covers a wide of range of offences under Swedish law, including inappropriate physical contact with another adult.

He called the allegations "without basis" in a Twitter posting and questioned the motives behind them.

The Swedish tabloid newspaper Aftonbladet quoted Mr Assange as saying the allegations had caused damage because WikiLeaks' "enemies" could use them to discredit the site.

"I don't know who's behind this but we have been warned that, for example, the Pentagon plans to use dirty tricks to spoil things for us," he said. "I have also been warned about sex traps."

Mr Assange denied molesting anyone.