Julian Assange has written a letter to King Charles ahead of his coronation inviting him to visit the UK prison where the WikiLeaks founder has been captive for more than four years “on behalf of an embarrassed foreign sovereign”.
The letter is the first document the Australian journalist and WikiLeaks founder has written and published since his time in Belmarsh prison in London and accounts the horrors of his life there.
“On the coronation of my liege, I thought it only fitting to extend a heartfelt invitation to you to commemorate this momentous occasion by visiting your very own kingdom within a kingdom: his majesty’s prison Belmarsh,” Assange writes.
“One can truly know the measure of a society by how it treats its prisoners, and your kingdom has surely excelled in that regard.
“It is here that 687 of your loyal subjects are held, supporting the United Kingdom’s record as the nation with the largest prison population in Western Europe.”
Assange, an Australian citizen, remains at Belmarsh as he fights a US attempt to extradite him to face charges in connection with the publication of hundreds of thousands of leaked documents about the Afghanistan and Iraq wars as well as diplomatic cables.
He goes on to point sarcastically to the UK government’s commitment to roll out the biggest expansion of prison places in more than a century, and the “culinary delights” of eating on a budget of two pounds per day.
“As a political prisoner, held at your majesty’s pleasure on behalf of an embarrassed foreign sovereign, I am honoured to reside within the walls of this world class institution,” Assange writes.
“Beyond the gustatory pleasures … you will also have the opportunity to pay your respects to my late friend Manoel Santos, a gay man facing deportation to Bolsonaro’s Brazil, who took his own life just eight yards from my cell using a crude rope fashioned from his bedsheets.”
Assange goes on to invite the King to the most “isolated place within [the] walls” of Belmarsh – “Healthcare, or ‘Hellcare’” and the Belmarsh “End of Life Suite”.
“Listen closely, and you may hear the prisoners’ cries of ‘Brother, I’m going to die in here’, a testament to the quality of both life and death within your prison,” Assange writes.
“I implore you, King Charles, to visit His Majesty’s Prison Belmarsh, for it is an honour befitting a king.
“As you embark upon your reign, may you always remember the words of the King James Bible: ‘Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy’. And may mercy be the guiding light of your kingdom, both within and without the walls of Belmarsh.”
On Friday, the Australian opposition leader, Peter Dutton, agreed with the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, that the detention of Assange needed to come to an end.
For the first time in more than a decade, the leaders of Australia’s major political parties both publicly back a diplomatic intervention in the case, with Albanese saying “enough is enough” and Dutton agreeing it has “gone on too long”.
Albanese told journalists in the UK, where he is attending King Charles’ coronation, that the matter needed to be brought to a conclusion and he was continuing to raise it through diplomatic channels.
“There is nothing to be served by his ongoing incarceration,” Albanese said. “And I am concerned about Mr Assange’s mental health. There was a court decision here in the United Kingdom that was overturned on appeal that went to Mr Assange’s health as well and I am concerned for him.”
On Friday morning, the opposition leader told ABC radio RN Breakfast it had “gone on for too long” at the “ fault of many people”.
A cross-section of Australian politicians have been raising the matter internally with their colleagues and international counterparts for the last few years, rallying for Assange’s freedom. Nearly 50 federal parliamentarians have called on the US to drop its extradition bid.
