WikiLeaks struggles to stay online as hostility and anger grow.

GENEVA (AFP) - The net tightened around WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange Monday as Swiss authorities shut a bank account and a report said British police received an international arrest warrant issued by Sweden.

It comes as the whistle-blowing website unveiled a secret US list of key infrastructure sites around the world that could be targetted by terrorists, ranging from undersea cables to the manufacturer of smallpox vaccine.

The Swiss Post Office's banking arm said it had closed an account set up by the embattled Australian after he gave false information.

"PostFinance has ended its business relationship with WikiLeaks founder Julian Paul Assange," the bank said in a statement.

PostFinance said it shut down Assange's account after the Australian provided false information about his place of residence which his applicaton had said was in Geneva.

WikiLeaks had advertised the PostFinance account details online to "donate directly to the Julian Assange and other WikiLeaks Staff Defence Fund," giving an account name of "Assange Julian Paul, Geneve."

Meanwhile, British police received an international arrest warrant issued by Sweden, suggesting Assange may be arrested soon, the BBC reported.

The elusive 39-year-old is thought to be hiding in Britain, but police there have up until now been unable to arrest him because the original warrant issued in Stockholm was incomplete.

A court in the Swedish capital had ordered on November 18 an arrest warrant for Assange for questioning on suspicions of "rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion" in Sweden in August.

In one of its most explosive leaks of US secrets so far, WikiLeaks divulged a list of key infrastructure sites around the world that, if attacked by terrorists, could critically harm US security.

The website released a State Department cable from February 2009 asking US missions to update a list of infrastructure and key resources worldwide whose loss "could critically impact" the country's public health, economic life and national security.

The list detailed undersea cables, key communications, ports, mineral resources and firms of strategic importance in countries ranging from Britain to New Zealand, via Africa, the Middle East and China.

Also listed were European manufacturers of vaccines for smallpox and rabies, an Italian maker of treatment for snake-bite venom, and a German company making treatment for plutonium poisoning.

Compilation of the list would help "prevent, deter, neutralize or mitigate the effects of deliberate efforts by terrorists to destroy, incapacitate or exploit" sites deemed of "vital" importance to the United States, the cable said.

Britain condemned the release, which gave locations of British undersea cables, satellite systems and defence plants, as "damaging to national security".

Security analysts said the leak posed a serious danger.

"This could give ideas to all sorts of people, not only Islamic terrorists," said Eric Denece, the head of the French Centre for Intelligence Research

"Animal rights extremists, criminal networks, far-right or far-left groups, anarchists: this could help them put in place a list of priorities."

The release will add to the political storm engulfing WikiLeaks and Assange, who broke cover on Friday to say in an online chat that he had boosted his security after receiving death threats.

The website is already battling to secure its avenues for financial donations online, and has been hop-scotching across servers and legal jurisdictions to evade a total shutdown.

Facing repeated cyber-attack, WikiLeaks has meanwhile moved to ensure its information remains available. Mirror websites, which replicate WikiLeaks' data, have sprung up on servers in various countries.

The leaks have led Washington to plan a major reshuffle of its diplomats, military officers and intelligence operatives who have been compromised.

Among the latest revelations:

-- Qatar is using the Arabic TV news channel Al-Jazeera as a bargaining chip in negotiations with other countries, despite the broadcaster's insistence that it is editorially independent.

-- Lebanon's Prime Minister Saad Hariri feared another war with Israel would mean the "death" of his pro-Western alliance.

-- Former Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd warning US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that force might be needed against China "if everything goes wrong".