MIDDLE EAST: Every day at noon, Mordechai Vanunu climbs the stone steps of an Anglican church bell-tower in East Jerusalem and rings the bells.
For Israel's high-profile nuclear whistleblower, this simple daily gesture is an act of defiance, a signal that he will not be silenced.
It is almost a year since the 50-year-old former nuclear technician was released from an Israeli prison after serving 18 years for exposing the country's secret atomic weapons programme.
Since then, he has lived in the guesthouse attached to St George's Cathedral, owned by the Anglican Church which Vanunu converted to from Judaism 18 years ago.
Vanunu's freedom has not been what he had hoped for; he is obliged to report his movements to the Israeli authorities and remains prohibited from leaving the Jewish state, which he disavows and wants to flee.
Seated yesterday in the guesthouse's tranquil courtyard amid citrus trees, Vanunu was relaxed and measured as he talked about his life after prison.
Tanned and fit, he was dressed casually in a blue shirt and beige trousers, with a large silver crucifix dangling from his neck.
Vanunu said he volunteered for the job of church bell-ringer last June, both to get exercise from climbing to the belfry, and to gain a new voice.
"By ringing the bell it's like I'm saying remember my message, remember my secrets. Anyone who hears the bell and knows it's Vanunu, they know what is behind this," he said.
"From the tower I can see the district court where I was sentenced to 18 years . . . I'm telling them that what they did 18 years ago did not work. I'm here, alive."
Since his release, Vanunu has vigorously resisted attempts by the Israeli authorities to silence him, on the grounds that he was a risk to state security and could still have secrets to tell.
He has long maintained that he has no more secrets to offer up to the world, and has consistently flouted post-release restrictions which have precluded him from talking to journalists and meeting foreign nationals. Instead, anti-nuclear activists have been making pilgrimages to his residence.
Among his international supporters is the Northern Irish Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire, whose latest trip was last December.
Maguire, who nominated Vanunu for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001, is due to visit him along with other Irish supporters late next month, when the post-release restrictions imposed on him for 12 months are due for review.
Such displays of international solidarity have long been Vanunu's lifeline, sustaining him during his long incarceration, the first 11 years of which he spent in solitary confinement. He has long been alienated from most of his large family of deeply religious Jews who migrated to Israel from Morocco in 1963.
Only two of his brothers, both of whom live abroad, are supportive of him. Many of his fellow nationals view him as a traitor who has betrayed his country and his religion.
Vanunu shot to international fame in 1986 when he gave the Sunday Times of London a description and photographs of Israel's nuclear reactor in the desert town of Dimona, where he had worked for nine years as a technician.
Based on his accounts, experts at the time estimated that Israel had the world's sixth-largest stockpile of nuclear weapons. As part of its controversial policy of "nuclear ambiguity", Israel neither confirms nor denies it has nuclear weapons.
Shortly before the Sunday Times report was published, Vanunu was kidnapped by the Israeli spy agency Mossad after a female agent posing as an American tourist lured him to Rome in a "honeytrap" operation. Following his capture, he was smuggled to Israel by yacht, tried behind closed doors and sentenced to 18 years for treason and espionage.
Reflecting on the past 11 months of relative freedom, Vanunu said he felt he had adapted well to his new life, despite the constant Israeli surveillance. Apart from court appearances, he confines himself to predominantly Arab East Jerusalem, preferring not to encounter Israelis or speak Hebrew. He is supportive of the Palestinian cause and an advocate of a secular state with equal rights for Jews and Palestinians.
Asked if he fears for his safety, Vanunu replied that "everything is possible here but I am trying to behave like I have no fear, walk the street, to ignore these people but I bear in mind that crazy people can be anywhere."
Vanunu hopes he will be able to gain asylum abroad if Israel releases its travel restrictions when they are reviewed next month. Ultimately, he wants to move to America where his adoptive parents live, write a memoir, and research and teach history or politics at a university.
On the wall of his modest room hangs a calendar depicting Irish landscape photographs. He says he would like to visit Ireland and Scotland.
"I would want to see Ireland. I have contacts with Irish people during my time in prison. They used to write to me and I wrote to them. I read about Irish history. So now I have many, many friends and I would be happy to see Ireland."
Over a week ago, he was indicted for violating the terms of his release on 21 occasions. Early next month he will appear in court to face these charges, which could lead to him being imprisoned for up to three years.
However, Vanunu yesterday appeared confident that he would not face another prison term.
"Maybe they will warn me again or I don't know, but they will not stop me talking," he said.