We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks Page #9

---

I'd prefer, if it didn't

have to have a face.

And we tried to do

that for a while.

Urn...

And people...

Just the demand was sort of so great,

people just started inventing faces.

INTERVIEWER 1:

Some call him a hero,

some see him as a threat

to national security.

Julian, thank you

for joining us...

This afternoon I talked to

the man behind the leaks...

LARRY KING:
Julian Assange.

INTERVIEWER 2:
Julian Assange.

VIEIRA:
Mr. Assange,

good morning to you.

INTERVIEWER 3:
What

have the leaks achieved?

We have published

more classified documents

than the rest of the

world press combined.

INTERVIEWER 4:

So it's journalistic.

I'm fond of the phrase,

"Lights on, rats out."

Do you feel you have

accomplished what you wanted to

with the release

of these documents?

Not yet.

You.

What?

Jesus Christ.

So, two with you

on the front.

My God, look...

Another double

page spread.

JOSEPH FARRELL:
I think

that's the best photo.

That's not a bad photo.

I think

it's really good.

And then you've got...

You've got your own banner

at the top here for three

pages, in The Times.

I'm untouchable now

in this country.

DAVIS:
Untouchable?

ASSANGE:
Untouchable.

DAVIS:
That's

a bit of hubris.

Huh?

[DAVIS SPEAKING]

That's a bit of hubris.

Well, for a couple of days.

It can wear off. But the

next few days, untouchable.

The founder of WikiLeaks found

himself making news again today.

Sweden issued a warrant for

the arrest of Julian Assange.

NEWS ANCHOR:
Right now

Swedish authorities are

looking to question WikiLeaks

founder Julian Assange.

Swedish authorities have issued

a warrant for his arrest

on suspicion of molestation and

rape in two separate cases.

DAVIES:
Saturday,

August the 21st, I woke up.

Another journalist

had sent an email

with a link to the website of the

Swedish newspaper Expressen.

I went to this website and I

thought, "Well, this is a joke,

"this is like

a spoof newspaper."

These huge headlines,

including one which claims

that Julian Assange has

sexually assaulted two women.

"What is this about?"

So, I phoned a guy

in Stockholm

who is the main coordinator

for WikiLeaks in that city.

So I came up to this guy and I

said, "What on earth is going on?"

NARRATOR:
The man in

Sweden was Donald Bostrom,

[CLICKING TONGUE]

an investigative

journalist

who had agreed to help Julian Assange

while he was in the country.

It was...

kind of the new Mick Jagger.

Yeah. I mean,

really, really.

Groupies, stalkers, media...

everyone had a big interest

in Julian at the time.

And he liked it.

INTERVIEWER:
He liked it?

Mmm-hmm. Of course.

[UPBEAT MUSIC PLAYING]

NARRATOR:
Assange had thought

of moving his base to Sweden,

where WikiLeaks

kept its servers.

Laws were more favorable

to press freedoms

and Assange had

a growing fan base.

Fame offered Assange

a platform,

but it also made him

a visible target.

[BOSTROM SPEAKING]

I said to Julian, "I think

you are on the list..."

"of undesirable people

for some governments."

"Recently, in Russia"

"some journalists

were compromised"

"by girls in short skirts."

"it's a very easy trick."

"So please, take it easy."

That was exactly one week

before everything happened.

REPORTER 1:
Breaking news... REPORTER

2:
Internet platform WikiLeaks...

REPORTER 3:
The Australian

has denied the allegations

saying that

they are without basis...

[REPORTER SPEAKING SPANISH]

Julian Assange denied having

had non-consensual relations

with the two women of

35 and 25 years of age.

[REPORTER SPEAKING MAN DARIN]

She described Assange

as violent

and said she tried to

refuse his advances.

She only consented

to having sex

after he agreed to

wear a condom.

But the condom somehow broke.

NARRATOR:
An unknown source leaked

the police report to the press.

It included the

testimony of Assange,

the two women,

and, surprisingly,

a picture of a torn condom.

There were other

peculiar things going on.

The case of one woman was

dropped, and then reopened.

The general sense was, it's awful

curious that these charges would emerge

just after a very embarrassing

and damaging leak.

There were various

possibilities here.

One was that some women

who wanted to sell a story

to the newspapers

had set him up.

Another was that a really nasty

right-wing group in Sweden

had conspired to set him up.

Maybe some dark agency from the

United States has done this.

And way out on the extreme

ranges of possibility,

well, maybe he did it,

I don't know!

Did anything happen between

you and these two women

that could be construed

as sexual coercion or rape?

No words, no actions,

no violence.

There is nothing that could

be construed as rape.

Nothing at all.

Or sexual coercion?

Well, I don't know

what the hell that means.

There's no doubt that this

organization is under siege...

It was clearly

a smear campaign...

[ASSANGE SPEAKING]

ASSANGE:
We were warned

by Australian intelligence

we would receive

such an attack.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange

is calling it a "smear campaign."

His supporters claim that the

warrant is a way of silencing him.

You're telling me this isn't a witch

hunt, this isn't a smear job? Come on.

One accuser apparently

worked with Cuban exiles

and there's a story around

that she's a CIA operative?

MICHAEL MOORE:
This whole thing stinks

to the high heavens, I gotta tell ya.

I've seen this

enough times,

where governments

and corporations,

they go after people with

this kind of lie and smear.

This is all a bunch of hooey

as far as I'm concerned.

Well, it's certainly a

surreal Swedish fairy tale.

The only thing that hasn't walked

onto stage yet are the trolls.

And I'm waiting

for them to arrive.

ASSANGE:
It is my role

to be the lightning rod,

to attract the attacks against

the organization for our work.

One aspect of that has been the legal

situation for yourself in Sweden.

I'm not going to talk about

that in relation to this.

But it does

affect WikiLeaks.

I will have to

walk if you're...

Do you still...

You had once talked...

If you're going to contaminate

this extremely serious interview

with questions about

my personal life...

[CLEARS THROAT]

I'm not, what I'm asking is,

if you feel that it's

an attack on WikiLeaks.

Okay, sorry.

Julian, I'm happy to go

onto the next question.

All I'm asking is...

Sorry.

You blew it.

NARRATOR:
The case in Sweden

was still unresolved.

While the investigation

continued,

prosecutors permitted Assange

to leave Sweden

with the understanding

that he would reappear.

But Assange never went back.

Convinced Sweden was a trap,

he went underground in London.

DAVIS:
Julian has

a certain paranoia,

but in the time

I was with him

I think that high security

awareness was actually relevant,

it was appropriate.

Mind you, he'd been

living like that

for the past, you know,

five or ten years

when it probably

wasn't appropriate.

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes