[On Wednesday, Mr. Patiño, the foreign minister, said that the British authorities had threatened to barge into the country’s embassy in London if officials did not hand over Mr. Assange. “Today we have received from the United Kingdom an explicit threat in writing that they could assault our embassy in London if Ecuador does not hand over Julian Assange,” Mr. Patiño said at a news conference in Quito , adding defiantly, “We are not a British colony.”]
By William
Neuman And Maggy Ayala
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Will Oliver/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Outside the Ecuadorean embassy in
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The announcement was made by the Ecuadorean foreign
minister, Ricardo Patiño, at a news conference in Quito . He also said he hoped Britain would permit Mr. Assange to
leave the embassy in London for Ecuador — a request Britain has rejected,
saying it has a legal obligation to extradite Mr. Assange to Sweden, where is
wanted to face questioning about allegations of sexual misbehavior.
The minister said his government had taken the decision
after the authorities in Britain, Sweden and the United States had refused to
give guarantees that, if Mr. Assange were extradited to Sweden, he would not
then be sent on to America to face other charges.
The British Foreign Office said it was disappointed
by the Ecuadorean announcement but remained committed to a negotiated outcome
to the standoff.
Those close to Mr. Assange have said one reason he does not
want to be sent to Sweden is that he fears being charged with crimes in the United States for the release in 2010 of thousands of secret documents
and diplomatic cables relating to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan , as well as to American relations with other governments.
An Ecuadorean official said late Wednesday that the British
government had made it clear it would not allow Mr. Assange to leave the
country to travel to Ecuador , so even with a grant of asylum or similar protection, he
would probably remain stuck in the embassy.
In advance of the announcement from Quito , supporters of Mr. Assange gathered outside the embassy in
London on Thursday, refusing police orders to move across the
road until officers bundled three of them into police vans and arrested them.
On Wednesday, Mr. Patiño, the foreign minister, said that
the British authorities had threatened to barge into the country’s embassy in London if officials did not hand over Mr. Assange. “Today we have
received from the United Kingdom an explicit threat in writing that they could assault our
embassy in London if Ecuador does not hand over Julian Assange,” Mr. Patiño said at a
news conference in Quito , adding defiantly, “We are not a British colony.”
Mr. Assange arrived at the embassy on June 19, seeking to
avoid extradition to Sweden , where he is wanted for questioning over accusations that
he sexually assaulted two women.
The embassy is in a modest apartment in a redbrick block
just behind the Harrods department store in the upscale Knightsbridge
neighborhood.
Mr. Assange, said Jérémie Zimmerman, a friend who has
spoken with him recently, has found the narrowing of his horizons hard. “It is
quite difficult not to be able to get out in the street for all this time,” he
said. “He lived for so many years free, without even a home to limit him. And
now he is isolated.”
The WikiLeaks founder sleeps on an air mattress in a small
office that has been converted to a bedroom, according to accounts of those who
have visited him. He has access to a computer and continues to oversee
WikiLeaks, his lieutenants have said. Reporters outside the building have seen
food being delivered from nearby restaurants.
His presence is a challenge for employees of the embassy.
One British government official, citing a conversation with a member of the
embassy staff, said that the situation was surreal.
Mr. Assange, who previously lived a nomadic existence
staying in the homes of friends, has developed a reputation as a unique
houseguest.
Daniel Domscheit-Berg, who ran WikiLeaks with Mr. Assange
until the two had a falling-out in 2010, accused Mr. Assange in a memoir of
staying for several months, uninvited, and of abusing his cat.
In an interview with The New York Times in early 2011, Mr.
Domscheit-Berg added that Mr. Assange had refused to flush the toilet during
his entire stay. Mr. Assange has countered that Mr. Domscheit-Berg, and others
who have given personal accounts along these lines, are motivated by malice.
A diplomat familiar with Mr. Assange’s situation said that
he spent his time in a back room, which gets no direct sunlight. Several weeks
ago he had a bad cold and appeared depressed, the source said.
“He can’t get outside to see the sun,” his mother,
Christine Assange, said in a recent interview conducted in Quito for BBC Mundo, a BBC Web site. “I’m worried about his
health, as I would be for anybody who is having to stay indoors and not get
exercise and have sunlight.”
She said some of Mr. Assange’s friends have encouraged him
to put on music and dance as a way of getting physical activity and that they
had also brought sunlamps.
Under diplomatic protocol, Mr. Assange was thought to be
off limits while in the embassy. But the BBC reported Wednesday that British
officials had raised the notion of revoking the diplomatic immunity of the
Ecuadorean Embassy, allowing British officials to enter.
A spokeswoman for Britain ’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office declined to make the
government’s correspondence with the Ecuadoreans public. But in a statement,
the Foreign Office said it had consistently made its position clear in
discussions.
“The U.K. has a legal obligation to extradite Mr. Assange to Sweden to face questioning over allegations of sexual offenses,
and we remain determined to fulfill this obligation,” the statement said.
British officials have “drawn the Ecuadoreans’ attention to relevant provisions
of our law,” the statement said, but the government is “still committed to
reaching a mutually acceptable solution.”
Although WikiLeaks has shrunk substantially during the 20
months of Mr. Assange’s legal battle in Britain, losing many of its most
skilled computer experts along with several of Mr. Assange’s closest associates
in building the organization, it has continued to issue statements about his
plight.
On Thursday, ahead of the Ecuadorean decision, it issued a
new, unsigned statement describing Britain’s warning that it might suspend the
embassy’s immunity as part of an action to arrest Mr. Assange as a “resort to
intimidation” and a breach of the Vienna Convention governing diplomatic
relations between states.
“We remind the public that these extraordinary actions are
being taken to detain a man who has not been charged with any crime in any
country,” the statement said. It added: “We further urge the U.K. government to show restraint, and to consider the dire ramifications
of any violation of the elementary norms of international law.”
It struck many as odd that Mr. Assange, who shot to fame as
a fighter for media freedom, chose Ecuador as a potential refuge. Mr. Correa has presided over a
crackdown on journalists there.
But when Mr. Assange arrived at the embassy, he issued a
statement saying that Mr. Correa had invited him to seek asylum in Ecuador during an interview for Mr. Assange’s TV show on Russia
Today, an English-language cable channel financed by the government of Vladimir
V. Putin.
William Neuman reported from Caracas, and
Maggy Ayala from Quito, Ecuador Ravi
Somaiya and Alan Cowell contributed reporting from London
