So Julian Assange has
exchanged the relative comforts of his own room at the Ecuadorian
Embassy in London for the more spartan shared accommodation offered
to residents at Her Majesty's pleasure. I suspect the prospect of
having company in his cell will not necessarily be an improvement on
the 7 years of his self enforced solitary confinement – but if
things pan out as widely expected it's something he will simply have
to get used to, either in the UK, in Sweden or (the stuff of his
nightmares) the good ole US of A.
He is clearly a
strange, even disturbed, individual. If the truth is being told by
his former hosts, he is a deeply unpleasant man. Ignoring the rules
imposed by the Ecuadorian government on his stay, such as using a
non-declared mobile phone, hacking into the Embassy security system
and files, installing (allegedly for his own protection) security
cameras in his room are all somewhat rude things to do but given his
evident paranoia perhaps understandable. Not cleaning your bathroom
or showering for weeks on end is not simply lazy, it's filthy.
Extreme goat breath and dental problems because you haven't cleaned
your teeth for God knows how long is also questionable. Best not to
consider the state the contents of his laundry basket (on the
allegedly rare occasions it was emptied) must have been in. And as
for the most shocking allegation – smearing shit on the apartment
walls in some kind of deluded “dirty protest” - well, that is
beyond the pale, not at all the sort of thing any normal
self-respecting house guest would do, and it's quite understandable
that he has been kicked out.
He has certainly gone
down-hill during the years of his incarceration. When he walked into
the place back in 2012 he was quite a smart, well dressed and – er
– clean individual. White shirt, tie, suit, smart haircut – the
debonair businessman rather than spy, enemy of the state or alleged
sex offender. The appearance changed gradually over the years, and
the smart suit and ties morphed into tee shirts, jeans and rather
tacky mock-leather jackets. The hair grew whiter and more unkempt.
By the time he was dragged, kicking and screaming (still seemingly
craving the attention of the assembled press and tv crews) down the
steps yesterday, he looked like a tramp. Bushy and untrimmed white
beard. Dirty looking white hair slicked straight back and with a
laughably small and stupid samurai bun thing at the back. Scruffy
and probably dirty clothes. I've seen smarter guys dossing under
cardboard boxes.
Dear, oh dear.
I remember when he
first came to prominence with his WikiLeaks web site (the one
Mr.Trump praised something like 164 times on his Presidential
Campaign trail, as it dished the dirt on Hillary, but yesterday
denied all knowledge of (“it's not my thing....”). I read a
report then in I think Newsweek about his activities, and was broadly
supportive. This was in 2010 and all the fuss about the
whistleblower Edward Snowden was all over the news, and of course
WikiLeaks (as well as the Guardian and other outlets who had used the
the purloined information) was heavily mentioned. It seemed to me
then, as it does now, that nobody should be above the law, whether
individual citizen or government agency. Shining a spotlight, no
matter how unwelcome, on the FBI, CIA, GCHQ or whoever was
transgressing and ignoring the law to questionable ends seemed a good
thing and still does. This is particularly so when the activities
are sanctioned by a government. The fact that huge organisations
like Google, Facebook and so on were doing very similar things –
essentially data harvesting and selling without the owner's
permission (and how exactly you define the precise “ownership” of
online data is a legal question that continues to exercise legal
minds still – and probably will for years to come) – did not
enter the argument. I don't even remember it being mentioned.
Then came the Bradley
(Chelsea) Manning Leak – the dumping of hundreds of thousands of
pieces of information – text messages, e-mails, reports, and –
most damaging of all – audio and video files that showed
incontrovertibly that US forces were carrying out, with dreadful
regularity and without a shred of regret or shame, atrocities that
were clearly war crimes. And the US government, probably with the
connivance of its allies (including the UK) was covering it all up.
I was working in Trinidad at the time with a team of Americans, and
they were apoplectic. In their view, without actually seeing any of
the stuff – on principal they were not prepared to look at the
evidence that was there for all to see – both Manning and Assange
were traitors, spies, devils incarnate..... You name an unfavourable
epithet and it was applied. Pretty much all of them were openly
calling for the firing squad (except one who suggested solitary
confinement in Leavenworth for the rest of his life). I had a look
at WikiLeaks myself, and the information there was shocking – but
none of my colleagues were interested. I thought he was actually
doing a public service, although his methods were questionable.
Subsequent interviews
shed some light on his activities. He was a hacker, pure and simple,
and had been for years. His insistence that he was no more than a
“publisher” - people passed the information to him, he and his
team vetted it and published it when satisfied of its veracity –
seemed a little contrived but he didn't seem to be doing anything
different to investigative journalists the world over, just using
more modern methods to achieve the same results. Grub Street moving
into the 21st century – and nothing at all wrong with
that.
I've dipped into the
site from time to time since then, but truth be told it's turgid,
unless you are in the intelligence community or an investigative
journalist yourself – which I am not. A lot of the content is not
in English, for a start – WikiLeaks has a global reach and seeks
its content accordingly. There is also just so much stuff there –
picking your way through to find the odd nugget (and without doubt
there are many) is a full-time job and needs a specific mentality
that I simply do not possess. It continues to provide its service
still, with or without Assange in day to day control.
But it was not the
WikiLeaks spy stuff that sent him scurrying up the steps of the
Ecuadorian Embassy seven years ago. It was something more simple,
more basic than that. He was a fugitive from the Swedish Justice
system, and fearing that the UK authorities were going to arrest him
and put him on the next available flight to Stockholm, he did his
runner.
He had been accused by
a pair of Swedish women of some sexual shenanigans in Gothenburg.
One woman pointed the finger at him for sexual assault – basically
a bit of unwanted fumbling in a nightclub somewhere: offensive and
completely unacceptable in this day and age, and deserving of the
Swedish police force's attention. The other charge was much more
serious – the woman claimed to have been raped in a hotel room by
Assange. It was mainly for this allegation that the Swedish
authorities requested he travel to Stockholm for an interview – no
charges had been brought against him for either charge (and still
haven't) - , “helping police with their enquiries”, as the press
would normally report it.
Assange basically hit
the panic button. Fearing arrest and deportation to the States,
where it was made clear a warrant for his arrest on espionage charges
relating to the Manning Dump was being prepared, he denied everything
and holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy, where he was granted
political asylum.
Which is where we are
today. He is now in British police custody and has 9 weeks to
prepare his defence, because the Americans, clearly pre-warned by
either Britain or Ecuador (or both) has issued an extradition request
on a quite minor charge of unauthorised accessing of a government
computer. More charges, more serious, are expected to follow, once
they've got their grubby little mitts on him. The Swedish authorities
have also stated they are considering applying for extradition to
them: although the assault claim has expired under a 5 year statute
of limitations, while he was holed up in his Embassy retreat, the
more serious rape allegation remains in force, and its statute of
limitation expires next year. To be clear: at this point, no charge
has ever been brought against him for this.
I am not outraged by
any of these goings on – except for his appalling behaviour in the
Embassy for all these years. I can't get upset about his assistance
in the Manning Dump because I seriously believe what he did was
intended to be in the public interest. The American troops'
behaviour that he highlighted was disgusting and unforgivable – and
if anyone should be on trial it should perhaps be any identifiable
individual who gave the order to take out innocent women and kids or
neutral journalists doing their job and then laughed as the order was
carried out, or the guys who pulled the trigger and cheered. They
are the murderers, not the guys who revealed their crimes to the
world at large.
I should probably be
more upset about the sex-pest allegations, because the offences –
sexual assault and rape – are clearly unacceptable, just wrong on
so many levels. But right now they are simply that: allegations. No
arrest has been made, as far as is public knowledge no evidence or
proof has come to light, and Assange is wanted in Sweden simply for
interview and if then needed, charge. Legally (if you accept the
usual innocent until proven guilty position) the bloke hasn't done
anything wrong. That is for the Swedish police and justice system to
prove. If they do so, they must throw the book at him and bang him
up for a long time. Then, I will get outraged.
But now? Frankly, I'm
ambivalent. I have a definite problem with extraditing him to the
States, because there is no way he will ever get a fair trial there –
not under the current regime, anyway. It would also set a nasty
precedence that would allow the Americans to demand the head of any
investigative journalist who does his job properly and exposes
something that the administration of the time disagrees with and
wants covered up. Cover up is never acceptable, no matter which
country or administration is involved.
So send him to Sweden
then? That seems to me the best answer: he's essentially been on the
run from their justice system rather than our own, the alleged rape
took place in Sweden and hence should be punished in Sweden – if
proven. Assange's fear remains that Sweden will merely pass him over
to America, and this might happen quickly (if charges are not brought
for this case) or at the end of his prison sentence (should it be
proven and he serve jail-time). It's a valid fear, I think. However
he ends up in America, he will likely face and quite probably (guilty
or not) serve years in the pen, maximum security.
But he has clearly
brought this entire situation onto himself, and seems to be a very
unpleasant and manipulative individual, with a gift (and need) for
self-publicity. A bit of Marmite character – he has many high
profile supporters (Lady Gaga and Pamela Anderson were regular
visitors to the Embassy, and of course Jeremy Corbyn and Diane Abbott
have already made their pitches in Parliament and on Twitter to stop
a US extradition. They should be more focused on Brexit!) but most
people either dislike him or like me don't really care too much.
At the end of the day,
it should not be Britain's problem – we have far more important
things to take care of than the future of Julian Assange.
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