Things are not looking good for NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden: his passport has been revoked, making him stateless and stuck in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport. In hopes of avoiding extradition, Snowden with the aid of a WikiLeaks’ legal advisor, has submitted asylum applications to 21 countries including Russia.
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Snowden has been stuck in Moscow for the last week since his passport was revoked en route to Ecuador. In a statement, the former NSA contractor said that President Barack Obama had reneged on his earlier statement of not permitting any diplomatic “wheeling and dealing” over the Snowdwen matter by allowing Vice President Joe Biden to put pressure on nations he was seeking asylum in.
Snowden also states that even though he has not been convicted of any crime, the revoking of passports shows that the Obama “administration now seeks to stop [him] exercising a basic right. A right that belongs to everybody. The right to seek asylum”.
The whistleblower has been the subject of news for the last month since leaking details for NSA’s spying project, PRISM. He reckons it’s not him the US government is afraid of, but an informed audience that will hold them accountable.
He is currently requesting asylum from the following countries:
The requests were made to a number of countries including the Republic of Austria, the Plurinational State of Bolivia, the Federative Republic of Brazil, the People’s Republic of China, the Republic of Cuba, the Republic of Finland, the French Republic, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Republic of India, the Italian Republic, the Republic of Ireland, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Republic of Nicaragua, the Kingdom of Norway, the Republic of Poland, the Russian Federation, the Kingdom of Spain, the Swiss Confederation and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.
Snowden’s full statement:
One week ago I left Hong Kong after it became clear that my freedom and safety were under threat for revealing the truth. My continued liberty has been owed to the efforts of friends new and old, family, and others who I have never met and probably never will. I trusted them with my life and they returned that trust with a faith in me for which I will always be thankful.
On Thursday, President Obama declared before the world that he would not permit any diplomatic “wheeling and dealing” over my case. Yet now it is being reported that after promising not to do so, the President ordered his Vice President to pressure the leaders of nations from which I have requested protection to deny my asylum petitions.
This kind of deception from a world leader is not justice, and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile. These are the old, bad tools of political aggression. Their purpose is to frighten, not me, but those who would come after me.
For decades the United States of America has been one of the strongest defenders of the human right to seek asylum. Sadly, this right, laid out and voted for by the U.S. in Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, is now being rejected by the current government of my country. The Obama administration has now adopted the strategy of using citizenship as a weapon. Although I am convicted of nothing, it has unilaterally revoked my passport, leaving me a stateless person. Without any judicial order, the administration now seeks to stop me exercising a basic right. A right that belongs to everybody. The right to seek asylum.
In the end the Obama administration is not afraid of whistleblowers like me, Bradley Manning or Thomas Drake. We are stateless, imprisoned, or powerless. No, the Obama administration is afraid of you. It is afraid of an informed, angry public demanding the constitutional government it was promised — and it should be.
I am unbowed in my convictions and impressed at the efforts taken by so many.
Edward Joseph Snowden
