Julian Assange’s Living Conditions Deteriorate – More Akin to Stasi-Era Dissident Than an Award-Winning Publisher in Asylum
By: Cassandra Fairbanks
The Gateway Pundit
Julian Assange’s current living conditions in the Embassy of Ecuador in London are more akin to those of a political dissident in China or Stasi-era Germany — not a journalist claiming political asylum from a country that once promised to protect his right to publish information.
I last visited Assange in March, days before the Ecuadorians placed the award-winning journalist in isolation for allegedly violating a draconian ban on all public political comments.
That isolation has since been — mostly — lifted, but I felt a sense of trepidation as I approached the embassy last Monday — the Ecuadorians, pressured by the U.S., are widely believed to have grown hostile to Assange, so I didn’t expect a warm welcome.
I wasn’t wrong. Things have changed a great deal since I last saw him. The surreal conditions are more invasive than visiting someone in a federal penitentiary — which I’ve done, by the way — where at least you can speak privately, provided you aren’t shouting and causing a scene.
In order to visit the publisher last year, I simply organized it with him and his lawyer and went. This time I was required to provide details about my social media, my employer, and my reason for visiting in advance of my arrival and hope to be approved.
If I wanted to bring my cell phone, I would have had to provide the brand, model, serial number, IMEI number and telephone number. Providing these details to a foreign nation with extreme surveillance seemed unwise, so I left it behind.
The Gateway Pundit
Julian Assange’s current living conditions in the Embassy of Ecuador in London are more akin to those of a political dissident in China or Stasi-era Germany — not a journalist claiming political asylum from a country that once promised to protect his right to publish information.
I last visited Assange in March, days before the Ecuadorians placed the award-winning journalist in isolation for allegedly violating a draconian ban on all public political comments.
That isolation has since been — mostly — lifted, but I felt a sense of trepidation as I approached the embassy last Monday — the Ecuadorians, pressured by the U.S., are widely believed to have grown hostile to Assange, so I didn’t expect a warm welcome.
I wasn’t wrong. Things have changed a great deal since I last saw him. The surreal conditions are more invasive than visiting someone in a federal penitentiary — which I’ve done, by the way — where at least you can speak privately, provided you aren’t shouting and causing a scene.
In order to visit the publisher last year, I simply organized it with him and his lawyer and went. This time I was required to provide details about my social media, my employer, and my reason for visiting in advance of my arrival and hope to be approved.
If I wanted to bring my cell phone, I would have had to provide the brand, model, serial number, IMEI number and telephone number. Providing these details to a foreign nation with extreme surveillance seemed unwise, so I left it behind.
Read more at The Gateway Pundit.
