
Former president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, during his interview with Declassified UK. Photo: Phil Miller/Declassified UK.
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Former president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, during his interview with Declassified UK. Photo: Phil Miller/Declassified UK.
Declassified UK’s Matt Kennard interviewed the former president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, who granted Julian Assange asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. Correa discussed about dealing with the British, how the US seeks to control his country, and the lawfare campaign against him.
On a cloudy Saturday morning in the middle of June 2012, Australian journalist Julian Assange walked into the Ecuadorian embassy in Knightsbridge, London.
He was a hunted man. Over the past two years, heโd been revealing the secrets, in alliance with the worldโs largest newspapers, of the USโs so-called War on Terror, an extraordinary explosion of violence which had been raging for more than a decade.
Britainโs Supreme Court had days beforeย approvedย his extradition to Sweden to be questioned over sexual assault allegations, for which he was never charged. The case wasย droppedย in 2019 after a review of the evidence.
This obscure embassy in London had barely garnered a single line in the news media in its history. But over the next seven years it would become a global story involvingย assassination plots, industrial levels ofย surveillance, and finally the British police forcibly evicting Assange in April 2019.
When Assange walked into the embassy, the president of Ecuador was Rafael Correa, a US-trained economist who had assumed power five years before in 2007. He was a key figure in the โpink tideโ of left-wing governments that took office across Latin America in the 2000s and would serve for a decade.
Correa is now living in Brussels, Belgium, after himself beingย grantedย political asylum to avoid persecution by Ecuador, the state he once headed.
In an ironic twist of fate, Correa and Assange, who has been in maximum-security Belmarsh prison for three and a half years, now share a lawyer as they both battle extradition. We are meeting at the offices of this lawyer. A giant Free Assange sign greets visitors at the entrance.
In a dark wood panelled room looking out onto the street, Correa tells me of that June day his foreign minister told him Assange had entered the embassy in London. โWe started studying his case,โ Correa says.
In August 2012โโafter two months of studying his dossierโโCorreaโs government granted Assange asylum to protect him from persecution by the US government for his journalistic activities.
โThere was not any possibility for him to have a fair process, that was not possible,โ Correa says. โI refer to the United States, there was too much public pressure, government pressure, media pressure against him.โ
British negotiations
Over the next five years, his government would enter protracted negotiations with the British authorities, who had enacted a secret campaign, codenamedย Operation Pelican, to get Assange out of the embassy. Correa is withering about the UKโs attitude to these negotiations.
โThey are historically an imperial power so they believe sometimes they continue with this power,โ he says of the British. โAnyway, against us that doesnโt work. And, yes, they were very rude. They wanted to impose their laws, their criteria, and we didnโt accept that.โ
He continues: โWe have, as a sovereign country, the right to grant asylum to anybody without giving any explanation. But we gave an explanation because we considered the British, the American government, the Swedish government, but we didnโt have to do that.โ
Correa says British pressure escalated soon after Assange entered the embassy.
โThere was a moment where the British authorities threatened us that they would enter our embassy,โ Correa says. โBut that was against international rights and absolutely illegal, but also sillyโฆ Why? Because they have many more embassies around the world than we do.โ
He pauses. โSo if they gave to the world such a bad example, the worst consequences will be against them. Because later, without any pretext, any reason, anybody could enter, in any country, their embassies.โ
John Shipton: Mexico’s Support for Assange Will Resonate Throughout the World
Ironically, the British pressure was much more blunt than Correa was receiving from the Americans.
โFrankly, I donโt remember the American government threatening us like the British government when they said that they can enter our embassy,โ Correa says. โWe didnโt receive from the American government, as long as I remember, any threat like this.โ
With Assange granted asylum by a friendly country like Ecuador, he should have been allowed safe passage out of the UK.
โOf course, the British are used to being obeyed, not to negotiate with a third-world country,โ Correa says. โThey tried to deal with us like a subordinate country.โ
โNo possibility of fair processโ
Correa tells me he has only ever spoken to Assange once, when he was interviewed by him for The Julian Assange Show, a short-livedย interview seriesย mostly done before he went into the embassy.
โI donโt know Julian Assange,โ Correa tells me. โI have never talked to him on the telephone or met him in person. You want my honest personal position? I donโt agree with all the things that Julian Assange did, but that is irrelevant.โ
He adds: โThe main point here is that he didnโt have any possibility of having a fair legal process in the United States. So absolutely we had a sovereign right to grant Julian Assange political asylum.โ
But Correa is not optimistic about the end goal of the Americans and British now they have their hands on him.
โThey want to kill him,โ he says. โThey are destroying him. They already destroyed him. My lawyer, and we are having this interview in my lawyerโs office in Brussels, well, heโs also Julian Assangeโs lawyer and he can tell you that heโs absolutely destroyed as a human being. So they already destroyed Julian Assange.โ
Correa continues: โWhat they want to do is make an example of Julian Assange: you can see what happened with someone who dared to reveal our secrets. But what secrets did Julian Assange reveal? War crimes. We have to thank him. Instead of that they are killing him.โ
Will Assange ever be free again? I ask. โI am very pessimistic. I donโt think so. They want to make an example of Assange: you cannot pass these red lines, you cannot deal with us, you cannot reveal our crimes. That is the message.โ
He continues: โI realise very well, I was president for ten years, that countries must have confidential information. But there are limits. You cannot hide war crimes. And even more, you can find a double standard here. Why? Because strictly speaking, Julian Assange didnโt publish the information.
โThe information was published by theย New York Times, byย Der Spiegel in Germany, byย El Paรญs in Spain, the Guardian in the UK. Why are they not being punished, being persecuted? Because they are the strongest part of the chain. They selected the weakest part of the chain: Julian Assange.โ
โCaptured by the CIAโ
When Assange was in the Ecuadorian embassy it likely became the most surveilled premises in the world. In June, the British governmentย admitted that Julian Assangeโs long-time lawyer Jennifer Robinson was likely the subject of โcovert surveillance which breached her human rightsโ. Ecuadorian officials inevitably received the same treatment.
โWe knew that moment thereโand we continue to knowโthat we were under surveillance,โ Correa says. โEven more, we engaged a special security company in order to protect the embassy, to protect Julian Assange, it was called UC Global from Spain. And they betrayed us. They sold the information to the CIA. They were, if you want, captured by the CIA.โ
It was later revealed that it was worse than surveillance. In September 2021,ย Yahoo Newsย published a story based on the testimony of 30 ex-US officials showing the CIA had sketched plans to kidnap or kill Assange in London. Correa says he read the article. Did it shock him?
โOf course, but it didnโt surprise me because we are used to that. This is Latin Americaโs history.โ He adds: โOne thing is very clear: for the American government Julian Assange is an enemyโ and they want to โdestroy his freedoms, his reputation, and perhaps his life.โ
It has been striking over recent years how Latin American leaders have led the fight for Assangeโs freedom, from Cristina Kirchnerย in Argentina toย Evo Moralesย in Bolivia.
Mexican president Andrรฉs Manuel Lรณpez Obrador has evenย shownย the infamous Collateral Murder video in his presidential press conference, offered Assange asylum and handed President Biden aย letter when they met pleading for Assangeโs release.
Why is it this continent leading this press freedom case of world-historical importance?
โI donโt have an answer for that,โ Correa says. โI am surprised, shocked, because Julian Assange was betrayed by journalists around the world, by governments around the world, by his own government, the Australian government.โ
He adds: โIf we had an Ecuadorian citizen suffering these kinds of pressures, persecution, illegal situation, our duty is to defend him, but the Australian government doesnโt care.โ
Press freedom
When Assange was granted asylum by Ecuador, much of the British press was looking for attack lines. One major one was that Correa was cracking down on press freedom in Ecuador.
Theย Financial Times, for example,ย wrote: โAssange was overlooking Correaโs worsening record when it comes to respecting freedom of the pressโ.
โThat is propaganda,โ Correa tells me. โCan you give me an example of an attack against press freedom? But because we always looked for the truth, because we used to respond to the lies of some journalists, we are against press freedomโฆ Itโs because we are against lies, against manipulation.โ
Correaโs administration was trying to break up the oligarchal control of the media, which is particularly pronounced in Latin America.
In fact, one example of the attack on press freedomย citedย by theย FTย was an anti-monopoly law which proposed shareholders and directors of media companies with more than 6% of national media companies should divest to other non-media interests.
โYou have to be absolutely aware that the instrument used to maintain the status quo in Latin America is the media,โ Correa tells me. โYou have to ask this question: to whom does this media belong? To the elites in order to continue with the control of our countries. And they are going to be against any government trying to change the really hard, tough Latin American situation. For instance, we continue to be one of the most unequal regions in the world.โ
Regional strategy
When Correa stepped down in 2017, the candidate nominated to fight the next election for his Alianza Paรญs party was Lenรญn Moreno. Moreno had been Correaโs vice president for six years, but after he won the 2017 election, he flipped.
Correaโs relatively moderate social democratic programme saw extreme poverty in Ecuador nearlyย halve, inequality fall dramatically, and social spending as a percentage of GDP nearly double.
But Moreno began steadily undoing theย progressive reformsย of the Correa administration,ย reintegratingย Ecuador into the Washington Consensus economic infrastructureโand getting close to the US.
A campaign of what has been termed โlawfareโ was launched against officials from the Correa administration. Many had to flee the country.
Morenoโs successor as vice president, Jorge Glas, was arrested andย sentencedย to six years in prison on bribery charges. He was released in April this year, but wasย rearrestedย the following month. Correa himself wasย targeted.
โItโs a regional strategy, not just against me,โ Correa says. โItโs against [former Brazilian president] Lula, against Evo Morales. Cristina Kirchnerโฆ So when you have this kind of real strategy, there is no coincidence. Itโs a regional strategy and that can happen only if the American embassies in our countries are backing that.โ
Correa believes his administrationโs granting of asylum to Assange is partly to blame.
โOf course part of this political persecution that I have received is because of Julian Assange. Also I cancelled the agreement to have an American base in our country in 2009. I stopped that. These are things that the American authorities do not forgive.โ
In 2009, Correaย refused to renew the lease for the US military base at the coastal city of Manta in western Ecuador. โWeโll renew the base on one condition: that they let us put a base in Miamiโan Ecuadorian base,โ he said. The Americans didnโt agree.
Any left-wing leader in Latin America knows that their biggest foe is the US, which has designated the Western Hemisphere as its area of influence since 1823. But during recent history, US methods of ridding the region of unwanted governments have diversified away from straight military coups like Guatemala in 1954 or Chile in 1973.
โItโs very difficult to have, especially in South America, a military invasion from the United States, that is not possible,โ Correa says. โBut there are more fine, if you want, ways in order to destabilise a government that they donโt like. For instance, financing the opposition groups, for instance, NGOs, and they receive this money, the financing, from the National Endowment for Democracy that everybody knows is the financial branch of the CIA.โ
Lawfare
But Correa says itโs not just the US that wants him and his legacy destroyed. โThere is also the media hate, the elite hateโฆ to try to conserve, to maintain the status quo. We are a danger for the status quo. We are a danger for their privileges.โ
In April 2020, an Ecuadorian court sentenced Correa to eight years in prison after finding him guilty on corruption charges. Correa was accused over aย $6,000 paymentย to his private account, which he says was a loan.
โEight years prison for a payment of $6,000,โ he says. โOne of the proofs is that I received from a common fund that we had at the presidency. They said that they were bribes. $6,000 put in my personal account in a public bank. But they have nothing. Itโs just a set up against us.โ
The sentence came hours before he was going to register himself as a candidate in the 2021 presidential election.
โIn this way, they prevented me from returning to my country,โ he says. โThey prevented me from being a candidate and they made Lasso president.โ
Guillermo Lasso, a rightwing banker who was embroiled in the Pandora Papers offshore tax leaks, narrowly won the 2021 election.
โThey are not just stealing our reputation, our stability, they are stealing our democracies,โ Correa says. โBut because all these attacks are against left-wing leaders, nobody cares.โ
The same thing happened in Brazil when Lula was put in prison in 2018 on corruption charges, which were eventually shown to beย politically motivated. He was in prison for the elections the same year.
โThey prevented Lula from being a candidate and they made Bolsonaro, a fascist, president of Brazil,โ Correa adds.
The betrayal
Up until 2017, Moreno had been an ally and a key figure in the Citizensโ Revolution that transformed Ecuador during Correaโs 10 years in charge. Why did he suddenly flip when he became president and try to destroy the whole movement he had been part of?
โOne of the strongest hypotheses is that Lenรญn Moreno is corrupted,โ Correa tells me. โWe realise very well now. We didnโt know that moment there, but now we know that he had a secret account in Panama. We have the number, we have everything.
โSo perhaps the American government knew that before us, and they put Moreno under control. Otherwise itโs very difficult to understand what was the switch of Moreno from our political programme, progressive programme, to the far right programme and to be absolutely subordinate to the United States.โ
He continues: โOne proof is that just one week after Lenรญn Moreno took office, he received Paul Manafort, the campaign chief of Donald Trump, and Moreno offered to Manafort to give Assange to the American government.
โYou have several testimonies of people who were in this meeting in Ecuador in the presidential palace one week after Lenรญn Moreno took office. So that moment there, he was negotiating with Julian Assange already.โ
In April 2019, likely as part of this deal, Moreno rescinded Assangeโs asylum and invited the British police into the Ecuadorian embassy to snatch the WikiLeaks founder. It was a watershed moment.
โThe country was humiliated,โ Correa says. โNobody else will trust Latin American countries in order to look for a political asylum. The damage is huge. Itโs huge and lasting. And, even more, it is against our constitution. You can see the Article 41 of our Constitution. This article explicitly prohibits giving to the persecutors someone persecuted. So he [Moreno] broke our constitution.
โBut there is no problem as long as you are acting according to the United States government or according to the media, the elites, and against Correa, that is perhaps the most important point.โ
It is clear that the pressure and stress of the extradition case and the turmoil in Ecuador has had a personal impact on Correa. He speaks quickly, rushing to express his defence against the constant attacks. He has a noticeable nervous energy, tapping his foot on the floor incessantly.
I ask Correa how he feels about it all.
โFor me itโs very hard,โ he says. โItโs very sad, very disappointing, that it happened. We have to continue fighting in order to recover the country.โ
Charles and Camilla
Correa says that Britain had a particularly colonial way of dealing with his country.
โWe tried to have a good relationship with any country in the world but in a framework of mutual respect,โ he tells me. โBut itโs clear that the UK disrespects a country like Ecuador, it was not just the case of Julian Assange.โ
Recently, Evo Moralesย toldย Declassified that Britain still has a โtotally colonial mindset.โ I ask Correa if he agrees. โUnfortunately, yes,โ he replies and then gives another example.
โIn 2009, the British ambassador called me and told me that Prince Charles with Camilla will come to the country to visit our Galapagos Islands. We were very honoured to have Prince Charles and Camilla. But the British ambassador not just told me, but ordered me, to receive Prince Charles on Sunday. And I told him, โCome on, ambassador, Sunday is my family day. I work from Monday until Saturday and try to dedicate my Sundays to my family.โโ
British ambassadorย Linda Cross insisted on Sunday. Correa then remonstrated, โBut heโs coming for vacation so we can receive him on Monday, we have a very nice ceremony at the Presidential Palace every Monday, the changing of the Presidential Guard. It is a very beautiful ceremony. We can invite Prince Charles with Camilla. There are a lot of people in the central park in front of the presidential palace. He can say hello to them.โ
Ambassador Cross continued to insist it must be Sunday.
โFinally, I sent my vice president to receive Prince Charles and Camilla, and I realised very well that they didnโt forgive me because next year I had to go to London. I was invited by the London School of Economics and other universities to give some speeches. And nobody received me as president of Ecuador at the airport in London.โ
This treatment is indicative of a continent that doesnโt exercise the British government, says Correa. โWe are not important for the UK government.โ
(Declassified UK) by Matt Kennard
Matt Kennard is chief investigator at Declassified UK. He was a fellow and then director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism in London. Follow him on Twitter @kennardmatt
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