How Assange begged Russia for a visa so he could f lee Britain
JULIAN Assange tried to flee Britain for Russia as the authorities closed in on him, according to a leak of internal files.
The WikiLeaks founder sent his passport to the Russian consulate in London in 2010 in the hope of being granted a visa.
In an unusual approach, he wrote a covering letter granting ‘full authority’ to a friend to handle the document and contact details for his lawyer.
The bid came as the net closed on the Australian hacker after he published a huge cache of sensitive US diplomatic papers.
On the same day, a ‘red notice’ for his arrest was published by Interpol as Assange faced claims of sexual assault in Sweden. That probe was dropped by Swedish prosecutors in 2017, and Assange has been holed up in Ecuador’s London embassy since claiming asylum after skipping bail in June 2012.
The cover letter was among emails, chat logs, financial records and footage laying bare the inner workings of WikiLeaks. The files included: Potential supporters listed by wealth and influence with a spreadsheet titled ‘Get Out of Jail Free’; Assange’s rapidly mounting legal bill as he paid a barrister £400 an hour to help him avoid extradition to Sweden;
A memo from Guatemalan human rights lawyer Renata Avila suggesting he should jump bail and escape to Brazil on a ship;
Details of how lawyers sent his supporters instructions on how to reach a court hearing in south-east London to try to persuade them to attend.
Associated Press, which obtained the leaked documents, verified their authenticity by cross-referencing information with former members of WikiLeaks.
Details of Assange’s attempt to seek the Kremlin’s help to evade Western authorities will provide welcome ammunition to his critics.
The FBI suspects he has been an unwitting tool of its military intelligence agency, which passed on his network emails designed to subvert the democratic process. These include emails stolen from Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman and other Democratic figures ahead of the 2016 US presidential election.
The same spy agency is suspected of co-ordinating the Salisbury novichok attack as well as the shooting down of a passenger jet over Ukraine.
The letter to the Russian consulate was reportedly drafted on November 29, the
‘A vague memory of those things’
day after WikiLeaks released the first batch of US State Department files.
A week later Assange turned himself into the Metropolitan Police. Assange remains holed up in Ecuador’s London embassy. He claims that being extradited to Sweden would lead to him being further detained and sent to the US to face charges of treason.
The relationship with his hosts has soured, leading to them switching off his internet access and limiting visits.
There has been widespread speculation that Assange could leave the embassy over the summer, partly motivated by his poor health. Israel Shamir, a controversial figure named in the letter as controlling the passport, said he cannot remember trying to obtain the visa.
‘I can’t possibly exclude that it happened,’ he said. ‘I have a very vague memory of those things.’
A spokesman for WikiLeaks declined to comment and labelled the revelations ‘rather uninteresting’. The Russian embassy said it would not discuss the personal details of visa applicants.