WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange secretly fathered two children with one of his lawyers while he was holed up at the Ecuadorean embassy in London and fighting extradition to the US, according to a report.
Stella Morris, a South African-born lawyer, began a relationship with Assange, 48, in 2015, she told the Daily Mail Saturday of the couple’s secret romance.
The couple’s first son, Gabriel, was born in 2017 said Morris, 37.
Their second child, Max, was born last year. Both births were filmed with a GoPro camera and the footage sent to Assange, the Mail reported.
The couple managed to keep their relationship and the birth of the children secret from the Ecuadorean staff and diplomats who had given Assange refuge at the embassy for seven years, the newspaper reported.
“I love Julian deeply, and I am looking forward to marrying him,” Morris told the Mail.
In an even odder twist, British rapper M.I.A. is a godmother to the children, who are both British citizens, the Mail reported.
The pair first met over a cup of tea in London in 2011, when her friend, Jennifer Robinson, who was working as Assange’s lawyer, introduced them.
Morris, who spent time in Sweden as a child, spoke Swedish fluently and helped defend him against 2010 rape allegations in that country, charges that were later dropped.
By the time Assange fathered his first child with Morris, he had been holed up in the embassy for four years.
“At the beginning, it was a working relationship. I was in the embassy every day and Julian became a friend,” she said.
“Over the years he went from being a person I enjoyed seeing to the man I wanted to see most in the world.
“His public image is not what I fell in love with, it’s the real person behind it,” she gushed.
They even planned to try to marry in the embassy after he picked out a diamond ring for her online.
“At the time that we started trying for a baby, it seemed that life was set to change for the better for Julian,” she said.
Assange has met both children — though the eldest had to be sneaked into the embassy at just 1 week old for the introduction to his father.
A friend carried the baby inside, pretending he was hers.
Assange also has an older son from a prior relationship.
Assange, who was transferred to a high-security prison in England last year, is wanted in the US on espionage charges for leaking thousands of US intelligence documents.
The couple, who were engaged in 2017, believe that US intelligence operatives tried to steal the DNA from one of Gabriel’s diapers when they became suspicious that Assange was the father.
The Mail learned of Assange’s secret family though details revealed in court papers filed in his extradition case.
At one time, Australian-born Assange was monitored 24 hours a day by Scotland Yard, but the exorbitant cost of more than $16 million prompted such a backlash, the police detail was scrapped.
In April 2019 Assange was moved to high-security Belmarsh Prison — where he now fears for his life due to the coronavirus pandemic and has sought release on bail.
Morris fears she will lose her love to the virus sweeping the globe.
“I am now terrified I will not see him alive again,” she said. “Julian has been fiercely protective of me and has done his best to shield me from the nightmares of his life.
“I have lived quietly and privately, raising Gabriel and Max on my own and longing for the day we could be together as a family. Now I have to speak out because I can see his life is on the brink.”