Media NSA Whistleblower Edward Snowden Charged with Espionage

[Samstwitch]

The Government Files Espionage Charges Against Edward Snowden

Late on a Friday afternoon before the first weekend of summer, some news out of the Department of Justice: Edward Snowden has been formally charged with espionage. Moreover, the United States government has asked Hong Kong to detain Snowden, the first step in the process to extradite him to face charges. Not a pleasant 30th birthday present for the NSA leaker.

The Washington Post reports on the announcement.

Snowden was charged with espionage, theft and conversion of government property, the officials said.​

The complaint was filed in the Eastern District of Virginia, a jurisdiction where Snowden’s former employer, Booz Allen Hamilton, is headquartered, and a district with a long track record in prosecuting cases with national security implications.​

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Depending on the number of counts in the complaint — which is sealed — Snowden faces a wide array of possible punishments. Under certain conditions, espionage convictions could warrant the death penalty. The "theft and conversion" charges certainly relate to Snowden taking files from the NSA; "conversion" is a legal term meaning to use someone else's property as your own. Such charges also vary in possible punishment, but are felonies.

Now that the complaint has been filed, the U.S. government has 60 days to file an indictment with the court in Hong Kong to ask that Snowden be extradited for trial. (We outlined the full process earlier this week.) A court in Hong Kong would then have to agree to the extradition, but Snowden has the right to appeal. In a separate Post article, the paper reported that Snowden could be jailed "at the Lai Chi Kok maximum-security facility in Kowloon, where conditions are harsh."

Snowden's final option is to apply for asylum from either Hong Kong or another country, like Iceland. Earlier today, an Icelandic businessman said he had a plane waiting at the Hong Kong airport to take Snowden to that country. He might want to get the engine running.

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[Samstwitch]

MORE DETAILS...
U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage in leaks about NSA surveillance programs

Federal prosecutors have filed a sealed criminal complaint against Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who leaked a trove of documents about top-secret surveillance programs, and the United States has asked Hong Kong to detain him on a provisional arrest warrant, according to U.S. officials.

Snowden was charged with espionage, theft and conversion of government property, the officials said.

The complaint was filed in the Eastern District of Virginia, a jurisdiction where Snowden’s former employer, Booz Allen Hamilton, is headquartered and a district with a long track record of prosecuting cases with national security implications.

A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment.

Snowden flew to Hong Kong last month after leaving his job at an NSA facility in Hawaii with a collection of highly classified documents that he acquired while working at the agency as a systems analyst.

The documents, some of which have been published in The Washington Post and Britain’s Guardian newspaper, detailed some of the most-secret surveillance operations undertaken by the United States and the United Kingdom, as well as classified legal memos and court orders underpinning the programs in the United States.

The 29-year-old intelligence analyst revealed himself June 9 as the leaker in an interview with the Guardian and said he went to Hong Kong because it provided him the “cultural and legal framework to allow me to work without being immediately detained.”

Snowden subsequently disappeared from public view; it is thought that he is still in the Chinese territory. Hong Kong has its own legislative and legal systems but ultimately answers to Beijing, under the “one country, two systems” arrangement.

The leaks have sparked national and international debates about the secret powers of the NSA to infringe on the privacy of Americans and foreigners. Officials from President Obama down have said they welcome the opportunity to explain the importance of the programs and the safeguards they say are built into them. Skeptics, including some in Congress, have said the NSA has assumed the power to soak up data about Americans that was never intended under the law.

There was never any doubt that the Justice Department would seek to prosecute Snowden for one of the most significant national security leaks in the country’s history. The Obama administration has shown a particular propensity to go after leakers and has launched more investigations that any previous administration.

Justice Department officials had already said that a criminal investigation of Snowden was underway and was being run out of the FBI’s Washington field office in conjunction with lawyers from the department’s National Security Division.

By filing a criminal complaint, prosecutors have a legal basis to make the request of the authorities in Hong Kong. Prosecutors now have 60 days to file an indictment, probably also under seal, and can then move to have Snowden extradited from Hong Kong for trial in the United States.

Snowden, however, can fight the extradition effort in the courts in Hong Kong. Any battle is likely to reach Hong Kong’s highest court and could last many months, lawyers in the United States and Hong Kong said.

The United States has an extradition treaty with Hong Kong, and U.S. officials said cooperation with the Chinese territory, which enjoys some autonomy from Beijing, has been good in previous cases.

The treaty, however, has an exception for political offenses, and espionage has traditionally been treated as a political offense. Snowden’s defense team in Hong Kong is likely to invoke part of the extradition treaty with the United States, which states that suspects will not be turned over to face criminal trial for offenses of a “political character.”

Snowden could also remain in Hong Kong if the Chinese government decides that it is not in the defense or foreign policy interests of the government in Beijing to have him sent back to the United States for trial.

Snowden could also apply for asylum in Hong Kong or attempt to reach another jurisdiction and seek asylum there before the authorities in Hong Kong act.

The anti-secrecy group Wikileaks has held some discussions with officials in Iceland about providing asylum to Snowden. A businessman in Iceland has offered to fly Snowden on a chartered jet to his country if he is granted asylum there.

The chief executive of Hong Kong, Leung Chun-ying, said last week that the city’s government would follow existing law if and when the U.S. government requested help.

“When the relevant mechanism is activated, the Hong Kong [Special Administrative Region] Government will handle the case of Mr. Snowden in accordance with the laws and established procedures of Hong Kong,” Leung said in a statement.

 

[Samstwitch]

Edward Snowden seeks asylum in Ecuador

Fugitive whistleblower Edward Snowden embarked on a new stage in his life on the run on Sunday night, fleeing Hong Kong by plane to Russia and lodging a bid to claim asylum in Ecuador.

The former US security contractor was in an airport hotel on Sunday night in Moscow but was expected to travel on soon, after Ecuador’s foreign ministry confirmed that they had received an asylum request. His route to Quito may take him through communist Cuba, which would be unlikely to heed any American requests for assistance.

Ecuador’s own Left-wing, anti-American president, Rafael Correa, made a similar asylum offer last August to founder of the WikiLeaks whistle-blowing organisation, Julian Assange.

Mr Assange has spent the last year seeking refuge in Ecuador’s embassy in London, where he has claimed diplomatic immunity against extradition to Sweden on sex charges.

Mr Snowden, 30, who leaked details of classified surveillance programmes to the media, slipped out of Hong Kong on an Aeroflot flight on Sunday morning, just two days after he was charged with two counts of espionage and one of theft by the US authorities. He was accompanied by Sarah Harrison, a British researcher who has previously worked with Mr Assange.

Shortly after he touched down at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport, Wikileaks announced that its staff had assisted Mr Snowden in arranging safe passage to Ecuador.

 

[Samstwitch]

Rand Paul: Clapper Lied, Snowden Told the Truth

 

[Samstwitch]

Edward Snowden Fears Death

On the run whistleblower Edward Snowden fears he will face execution if his asylum requests are rejected and he is sent to the United States to face prosecution.

“It is unlikely that I would receive a fair trial of proper treatment prior to trial, and face the possibility of life in prison or even death,” he told The Telegraph today.

Holland, Finland, Brazil, Poland and India have declined his requests for asylum. Ecuador, Austria, Norway, Switzerland, Germany and Spain have said they would consider his application for asylum only if made while in those countries.

Nicolás Maduro, the president of Venezuela, said during a trip to Russia that his country has not received an application for asylum from Snowden. While voicing support, Hugo Chávez‘s successor said he would not use his plane to ferry the whistleblower out of Russia.

“He did not kill anyone and he did not plant a bomb,” Maduro told legislators and reporters at the Russian Parliament. “He only said a big truth to prevent wars.” Maduro said Snowden deserves protection under international law.

Snowden is allegedly holed up at in the transit area of Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport. Russian president Vladimir Putin has said that the former Booz Allen Hamilton analyst would have to stop “harming US interests” if he wanted to stay in Russia.

“He abandoned his intention and his request to receive the chance of staying in Russia,” Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters in Moscow. “Hypothetically, Snowden could have stayed but on one condition – that he gave up his intention to carry out, one way or another, anti-American activity inflicting harm on the United States.”

Snowden told the British newspaper there is a concerted effort to intimidate those who would offer asylum to whistleblowers and make it virtually impossible for them to escape prosecution for espionage in the United States.

“Although I am convicted of nothing, (the United States) has unilaterally revoked my passport, leaving me a stateless person,” he said. “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.”
“Their purpose is to frighten, not me, but those who would come after me.”

In recent days, a number of people have said Snowden deserves to die for revealing the NSA’s formerly secret Prism surveillance program.
“I think Snowden is a terrible threat, I think he’s a terrible traitor, and you know what we used to do in the good old days when we were a strong country — you know what we used to do to traitors, right?” Donald Trump said on Fox News.

Former Congressman Ron Paul said last month that he fears the government will assassinate Snowden. “I’m worried about somebody in our government might kill him with a cruise missile or a drone missile,” Paul told Fox. “I mean, we live in a bad time where American citizens don’t even have rights and that they can be killed, but the gentleman is trying to tell the truth about what’s going on.”

Related Articles

• Snowden requested asylum in Moscow, but withdrew it when asked to cease ‘anti-US activity’ – Kremlin
• Ecuador still “considering” Snowden asylum request
• Snowden asked to brief Russian parliament on US espionage
• McCain: Russia Wants New Cold War Over Snowden
• ‘No stopping’ more Snowden revelations – Assange

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