Noting “Covid-19 is spreading within [the] walls” and Assange’s life is “at severe risk” as a result, Morris begins the piece by reflecting on her childhood in Botswana, a mere five miles from the country’s border with Apartheid South Africa.
“The foundations of the Apartheid system were precarious, so the regime met ideas of political reform with live ammunition. In June 1985, South African assassination squads crossed the border armed with machine guns, mortars and grenades. As soon as gunfire burst into the night, my parents wrapped me in a blanket. I slept as my parents raced the car to safety. The sound of explosions carried through the capital for the hour and a half it took to kill twelve people. The first person to be killed was a very close family friend…South Africa claimed the raid had targeted the armed wing of the ANC, but in reality most of the victims were innocent civilians and children killed as they lay sleeping in bed. We left Botswana within days,” she writes.
The raid, and memories of it, are said to have shaped her perspective of the world - and she fears the incarceration of her childrens’ father “will surely mark theirs”.
— Don't Extradite Assange (@DEAcampaign) May 1, 2020
She goes on to reveal when Gabriel, their first-born, was six months old, an embassy security contractor confessed to her they’d been told to steal Gabriel's DNA through his discarded nappies or pacifier. The whistleblower warned her Gabriel should not come into the embassy anymore as it wasn’t safe. It was then she realised all the precautions she’d taken, from piling layers on to disguise her pregnancy bump to changing her name, wouldn’t protect the couple or their children.
“We were totally exposed. These forces operated in a legal and ethical vacuum that engulfed us. I could write volumes about what happened in the months that followed. By the time I was pregnant with Max the pressure and harassment had become unbearable and I feared my pregnancy was at risk. When I was six months pregnant Julian and I decided I should stop going into the embassy. The next time I saw him was in Belmarsh prison,” she continues.
Morris also discusses the activities of UC Global, the Spanish private espionage firm which illegally spied on Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy, which is currently being investigated by Spain’s High Court.
"What happens to Assange could happen to all of us"
— Stella Moris (@StellaMoris1) April 29, 2020
Thank you to all the journalists who are speaking up to #SaveJulian #FreeAssange. https://t.co/TmapbiNA7f
The probe has revealed the company was sub-contracted by a US company “closely associated” with the Donald Trump administration and US intelligence agencies - and the “increasingly disturbing instructions” UC Global was given, such as following Morris’ mother or the baby DNA directive, had come straight from their US client.
“Around the same time I had been approached about the targeting of our baby, the company was thrashing out even more sinister plans concerning Julian’s life. Their alleged plots to poison or abduct Julian have been raised in UK extradition proceedings. A police raid at the security company director’s home turned up two handguns with their serial numbers filed off,” she continues.
Writing that she wants their children to grow up “with the clarity of conviction” she had as a little girl, and for them to believe that inequitable treatment “is not tolerated in mature democracies”, Morris says it’s not just her family that suffers from the infringements of her partner’s rights, as if Assange isn’t not off-limits “then nothing is”.
“The person responsible for allegedly ordering the theft of Gabriel's DNA is Mike Pompeo, who last month threatened the family members of lawyers working at the International Criminal Court. Why? Because the court had had the temerity to investigate alleged US war crimes in Afghanistan. The same crimes Julian exposed through WikiLeaks, and which the US wants to imprison him over. Julian needs to be released now. For him, for our family, and for the society we all want our children to grow up in,” Morris concludes.
