It does seem unbelievable that you can in essence go on the lam for five years and then you're free to carry on your life as before.
He has argued all along that if he left he would be whisked away for nefarious trials by America and if that was the case then this 5 year date of his hiding will make no difference. Unless he just wanted to avoid the trial for whatever reason.
Still for a trial you need a victim and in this case, that victim was not Assange and we have a trial and victim who will not see justice or any form of trial - fair or not. So can imagine how they feel about this.
The general principle, as far as I know, is based on the idea that the need for punishment is lessened by time.
[1] https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preskription#Preskriptionstide...
No, clearly not, especially considering the circumstances of the evasion is similar to a Swedish prison. He probably doesn't have a playstation in the Embassy, but he could have had one in his prison cell.
The only reason Assange submitted himself to being locked up into the embassy for 5 years is because he truly fears extradition to the US. In my opinion, rightly so. Remember Sweden allowed secret CIA extraordinary rendition, aka torture flights only a few years before the Assange event[1].
[1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05...