Julian Assange thrilled Interpol yesterday by promising to finally leave the Ecuadorian embassy “soon”. His grandiose press conference granted a rare glance inside Assange’s sumptuously decorated Hans Court home (conveniently close to Harrods, for those allowed outside). Which set us thinking — if it hadn’t been for his need to stay in a building with diplomatic immunity, what would it have cost Assange to spend the past two years holed up in his lovely corner of Knightsbridge?
Well, the closest hotel is The Capital, where the cheapest room is £210 a night. At least that includes a cream tea (Assange’s fondness for iced buns has seen him balloon) and free wi-fi (essential for any internet freedom fighter). Oh, and the in-house restaurant is called Outlaws. Assange is sure to have felt at home there but a two-year stopover would have set him back £153,300.
So The Londoner tracked down an alternative. Knightsbridge’s Holiday Inn will give you a room for £121 a night, so the WikiLeaks co-founder could have hung out there for two years for just £88,330. We rang to see if we could beat them down. “Would it have been a continuous stay or off-and-on?” asked the a hotel spokesperson. “Continuous. He can’t leave the room,” explained The Londoner. “In that case we would definitely have offered a discount.”
So will Assange offer his hosts recompense for their hospitality? “I can’t answer,” an embassy spokesperson tells us. The Ecuadorians might not be top of Assange’s list anyway — there’s Jemima Khan’s £20,000 in bail money to deal with first. Still, we’d hope Assange would make a contribution — Ecuador’s national debt is around $18 billion.
