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The Real Houseguest of the Ecuadorian Embassy
https://www.wired.com/story/julian-assange-robert-stone-ecuadorian-embassy-filth/IF JULIAN ASSANGE of WikiLeaks denies the Ecuadorian government’s stinging charge that he’s a disgusting houseguest, he’d do well not to deny that charge “categorically.” As a category, crimes against hospitality are one of Assange’s many fortes.
Assange, of course, has spent the better part of the decade hunkered down in the close quarters of Ecuador’s embassy in London, avoiding extradition to the United States, where he’s wanted on various criminal charges. However, incorrigible rogue that he is, Assange has managed even as an asylee to commit fresh offenses in defiance of a government—this time the Ecuadorian one, which has served as his extravagantly forbearing host since 2012.
It seems the foreign service, which originally granted Assange asylum on the grounds that he was a swashbuckling crusader for government transparency, had had enough of Assange’s neglect of his cat and its litter box. The embassy is also fed up with his indifference to basic hygiene and bathroom cleanliness; his mooching of food and Wi-Fi; his woodwork-damaging indoor-skateboarding habit; and his general Kato Kaelin–style freeloading. Assange’s six-year tenancy at the embassy has cost the government $6 million. So far.
In response, they issued a list of house rules last month. Assange found the rules oppressive, and sued the Ecuadorian government for violating his "fundamental rights and freedoms.” His lawyers argued, of all things, that Assange is being treated inhumanely by his hosts in the embassy; that it’s a privilege to host a mind so great, daring and free; and that such a mind cannot be answerable to litter boxes.
Assange, of course, has spent the better part of the decade hunkered down in the close quarters of Ecuador’s embassy in London, avoiding extradition to the United States, where he’s wanted on various criminal charges. However, incorrigible rogue that he is, Assange has managed even as an asylee to commit fresh offenses in defiance of a government—this time the Ecuadorian one, which has served as his extravagantly forbearing host since 2012.
It seems the foreign service, which originally granted Assange asylum on the grounds that he was a swashbuckling crusader for government transparency, had had enough of Assange’s neglect of his cat and its litter box. The embassy is also fed up with his indifference to basic hygiene and bathroom cleanliness; his mooching of food and Wi-Fi; his woodwork-damaging indoor-skateboarding habit; and his general Kato Kaelin–style freeloading. Assange’s six-year tenancy at the embassy has cost the government $6 million. So far.
In response, they issued a list of house rules last month. Assange found the rules oppressive, and sued the Ecuadorian government for violating his "fundamental rights and freedoms.” His lawyers argued, of all things, that Assange is being treated inhumanely by his hosts in the embassy; that it’s a privilege to host a mind so great, daring and free; and that such a mind cannot be answerable to litter boxes.
Sid
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