LONDON — After more than two years of taking refuge inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is swapping his body for a digital form. He has not specified when the procedure will be complete, only hinting it will be “soon.”
Assange is wanted by Swedish authorities for accusations he sexually assaulted two women — bogus charges, he insists, that are merely an excuse to lure him to Sweden so he can be extradited to the United States, where he faces federal charges related to confidential items he obtained and published in 2010.
Assange has repeatedly stated he can no longer endure life at the embassy, particularly the same shitty food he has eaten for two years, which he describes as “unfit for even a third-rate hacker from Togo.”
“Also, I’m obliged to share a lavatory with [Ambassador] Juan [Falconi Puig], and frankly, I’m sick of having to flush the toilet before I use it,” Assange said. “I won’t name names, but someone keeps dropping a big stinking turd without flushing it.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if the White House is coercing him into performing such obscene and grotesque acts,” he added.
Assange says he can only be free by transforming his physical body — including his brain — into trillions of strings of binary code. The hacker collective Anonymous has been assisting him with the complicated procedure. He has also received technical assistance from a team of Russian physicists.
“With any luck, my binary essence, the actual ones and zeroes that make me the brave genius I am, will be replicated and spread to all corners of the world, and America and its nefarious NSA will never be able to contain my spirit,” he said. “Never ever ever.”
“If they try, I’ll tell the world what I read on Michelle Obama’s Facebook page,” he warned.
If he does manage to be fully digitized, Assange says he will agree to have a USB stick of himself delivered to Swedish police so he may clear his reputation.
“I’ve got no reason to fear this smear campaign in Sweden, because I’ve done nothing wrong,” Assange said, his face already streaming away into a nearby hard drive. “In fact, I’ve known all along those two slutty women I rooted were really just hot cyborgs created by the FBI.”