and finally...


Why isn’t there more interest in Assange?


Chris Proctor would like to see the story on the big screen H


ow does this sound as a pitch for a high- budget film? A man determined to expose criminal


activities by the US government finds a Deep Throat source who provides him with classified files. After various newspapers publish them, he puts another cache of genuine information online. The US security services close in. He takes refuge in a foreign embassy. The CIA hires a third party to enter the building and plant bugs to record his conversations. The man is sprung from the embassy by UK police and placed in solitary confinement. The US demands he is handed over to them and a gripping trial commences, featuring celebrities and experts across the globe.


Upon this trial hang vital issues of press freedom, international law and the fate of a man under threat of life imprisonment… Not bad, eh? Well worth a punt? It seems not. This scenario has been


playing for real in UK courts for 18 months, featuring Julian Assange. Far from being accepted as a pitch for a blockbuster, it seldom makes a paragraph in the papers. The problem is that it is not sexy. ‘Sexy’ is Kim Kardashian’s lockdown party island, Matthew McConaughey’s thoughts about the ‘chemistry’ between Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt, or the riveting tale of a man who changed his forenames from Donald Jacob to Jacob Tiberius. It’s a great shame. Some of the dialogue I’ve put together for the pitch is almost Marx Brothers – like the


exchange between Assange’s lawyers and the US spokespeople about likely conditions in US jails if they lay their hands on him. “Will my client be held in solitary confinement if he is extradited to the US?”


“He will not.” “Will he be allowed out of his


prison cell, which is the size of a car parking space?” “Yes. For an hour. Every day.” “And will he be allowed to converse with other prisoners?” “No, he will not.” “You wouldn’t on reflection consider


that to be solitary confinement?” “Nope.” And if that exchange doesn’t tickle


you, there is still fun to be had with the gent who, acting for the CIA, popped into the Ecuadorian embassy where Assange was seeking asylum, to install a few bugs. Obviously the US government wanted to listen in when he spoke to his lawyers. Only reasonable. The bug man, however, failed to put a bug in the bog. He explained that he didn’t think Assange would brief his lawyers in the privy. This excuse was given short shrift, and he was sent back to the embassy to complete the job. The foolish fellow had not seen the need for a tap in the toilet. For the film, I’d like to build up the


character of the person paid by the US diplomatic service to listen to the tapes. An educated man with qualifications in international relations, he finds himself employed in a sound-proofed room in Grosvenor Square, carefully attentive to Assange’s movements, and I use that word


26 | theJournalist


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advisedly. All that training to end up in a foreign country listening to an Australian on the loo. I stress that the film’s humour would not be confined to the lavatorial. At times, it would soar into Samuel Beckett-like absurdity. Did Sam ever think of having an Australian facing a UK court accused of infringing US laws for publishing articles in European newspapers? Or having a state deciding which


It really is absurd that Donald Trump spent four years lying to the public as US president while Julian Assange wastes away in a UK prison for telling them the truth


truths were acceptable and which not? It’s like a burglar arguing that CCTV evidence was not to his liking as it could reflect badly on his image if he was seen, jemmy in hand and swag bag over his shoulder, engaged in the act of pilfering. And what about not allowing the defendant, Mr Assange, to explain why he’d done what he did? There is precedent for this, when Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon papers that helped to get Nixon impeached. He did exactly what Assange is accused of, but he’s now feted as a champion of freedom as opposed to being banged up in Belmarsh. Ellsberg told the UK court he wasn’t allowed to include any justification in his defence to the Espionage Act charges. Maybe, like Ellsberg, Assange will emerge a hero if the UK extradites him and after he completes his US jail term. Although, as the Americans are pushing for a 175-year stretch, he’s unlikely to enjoy his new celebrity. It really is absurd that Donald Trump


spent four years lying to the public as US president while Julian Assange wastes away in a UK prison for telling them the truth.


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