Snowden leaves Moscow airport, possibly granted asylum in Russia.

Godspeed Ed, Godspeed.

 

US intelligence leaker Snowden leaves Moscow airport

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-23535524#TWEET841668

US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden has left the Moscow airport where he has been staying since June, his lawyer and airport officials say.

The lawyer, Anatoly Kucherena, said he had received the necessary papers to enter Russian territory from the transit zone at Sheremetyevo Airport.

Unconfirmed reports say he has been granted temporary asylum in Russia.

The US has charged Mr Snowden with leaking details of its electronic surveillance programmes.

Edward Snowden was granted temporary asylum in Russia for a year and has now left Moscow airport under the care of WikiLeaks' Sarah Harrison.

He arrived in Moscow on 23 June from Hong Kong, after making his revelations.

The Snowden affair has caused diplomatic ructions around the world, upsetting the United States' close allies and traditional enemies.
Status question

Mr Snowden left the airport around 14:00 local time (10:00 GMT), the airport press office told the BBC.

Despite the heavy presence of news organisations at the airport, his departure was apparently not spotted by media.

It is unclear if he has been given the temporary asylum status he has requested or is still going through the process, the BBC's Daniel Sandford reports from Moscow. One may assume it is quite likely he will be granted the status, he adds.

However, the whistleblowing organisation Wikileaks, which has been helping him since he made his revelations, said in a tweet that he had been given refugee status.

"Edward Snowden was granted temporary asylum in Russia for a year and has now left Moscow airport under the care of Wikileaks' Sarah Harrison," it said.

The report could not be verified independently but Mr Kucherena also said he had been awarded temporary asylum.

A strongly worded US reaction can be expected shortly, as the news sinks in in the US, our correspondent says.

US Attorney General Eric Holder has given Moscow an assurance that Mr Snowden will not face the death penalty if extradited, but the Russians say they do not intend to hand him over.

Anti Federalist wrote:"...US Attorney General Eric Holder has given Moscow an assurance that Mr Snowden will not face the death penalty if extradited, but the Russians say they do not intend to hand him over..."

  Imagine that!

 

News Hawk wrote:

Anti Federalist wrote:"...US Attorney General Eric Holder has given Moscow an assurance that Mr Snowden will not face the death penalty if extradited, but the Russians say they do not intend to hand him over..."

  Imagine that!

 

I'm no big fan of Putin, nor was any kind of fan of Hugo...

But I do love it when they poke a finger in The Empire's eye.

John McCain wants to re-start the Cold War over this, apparently.


RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT ASYLUM FOR EDWARD SNOWDEN

August 1, 2013

http://www.mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressOffice.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=3a7c05de-043b-07c2-4246-fedb9c0420d2

Washington, D.C. ­– U.S. Senator John McCain today released the following statement regarding reports that the Russian government has granted Edward Snowden a one-year asylum:

“Russia’s action today is a disgrace and a deliberate effort to embarrass the United States. It is a slap in the face of all Americans. Now is the time to fundamentally rethink our relationship with Putin’s Russia. We need to deal with the Russia that is, not the Russia we might wish for. We cannot allow today’s action by Putin to stand without serious repercussions.

“The first thing we should do is significantly expand the Magnitsky Act list to hold accountable the many human violators who are still enjoying a culture of impunity in Russia. We should push for the completion of all phases of our missile defense programs in Europe, and move expeditiously on another round of NATO expansion, including the Republic of Georgia. We should challenge the political convictions and detentions of Russian dissidents such as Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Alexei Navalny. And perhaps most importantly, we should speak out on behalf of the many people in Russia who increasingly are finding the courage to peacefully demand greater freedom, accountability, and rule of law in Russia.

“Today’s action by Putin’s Russia should finally strip away the illusions that many Americans have had about Russia the past few years. We have long needed to take a more realistic approach to our relations with Russia, and I hope today we finally start.”

We should challenge the political convictions and detentions of Russian dissidents such as Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Alexei Navalny. And perhaps most importantly, we should speak out on behalf of the many people in Russia who increasingly are finding the courage to peacefully demand greater freedom, accountability, and rule of law in Russia.

And, at this point, I lost it...

McCain is almost as bad as Obama.

The Russians are demanding greater freedom? Something that we are not doing here. Why doesn't he see that we are losing our freedoms here every day?

McCain Declares War on Russia

Daniel McAdams at 10:47 am EDT on August 02, 2013

http://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/mccain-declares-war-on-russia/#more-446617

Fresh off of his flip-flop on aid to Egypt and his threats to vote for the left (neocon) interventionists in the Democratic Party should anyone remotely non-interventionist succeed in gaining the Republican nomination to be the next president, Senator John McCain is determined to light a new fire under the long dead ashes of the Cold War.

However, he no doubt chokes on the smoke of irony as he fumbles with his matches.

What has set McCain’s neoconservative nerve on edge is the finalization yesterday of NSA leaker Edward Snowden’s request for temporary asylum in Russia. According to McCain and his fellow neocons, when Washington demands extradition the rest of the world must immediately comply, regardless of the circumstances. However, as William Blum points out yesterday in Counterpunch:

[A]ccording to the Russian Interior Ministry, ‘Law agencies asked the US on many occasions to extradite wanted criminals through Interpol channels, but those requests were neither met nor even responded to.’ Amongst the individuals requested are militant Islamic insurgents from Chechnya, given asylum in the United States.

So Washington harbors those who support and commit violent acts of terrorism in Russia, while demanding the return of an individual who has simply exposed a police state that has been silently gathering strength like a botulinum in the bowels of corpus Americanus.

McCain’s hysterical demands range from the bombastic to the truly dangerous. He barked:

Russia’s action today is a disgrace and a deliberate effort to embarrass the United States. It is a slap in the face of all Americans. Now is the time to fundamentally rethink our relationship with Putin’s Russia. We need to deal with the Russia that is, not the Russia we might wish for.

He continued by calling for the listing of as many Russians as possible under the Magnitsky legislation in the US, which allows those considered – under dubious criteria – to be human rights violators to be prevented from entering the US and to have their assets seized by the US government.

Then, reprising his subsequently discredited position during the short 2008 Russian/Georgian conflict that “we are all Georgians now,” McCain all but called for the US to foment another Georgian war against Russia — this time with NATO providing back-up:

We should push for the completion of all phases of our missile defense programs in Europe, and move expeditiously on another round of NATO expansion, including the Republic of Georgia.

John McCain remains Chairman of the US government-funded regime change “NGO,” the International Republican Institute. The IRI and its sister organization, the National Democratic Institute, and various other family members like the American Center for International Labor, can throw around millions of US taxpayer dollars to the “right” kinds of NGOs. This comes in handy when you are in the regime change business. McCain should be taken seriously, therefore, when he makes thinly veiled threats to ramp up US efforts at a color revolution in Russia by demanding that the US…

…challenge the political convictions and detentions of Russian dissidents such as Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Alexei Navalny. And perhaps most importantly, we should speak out on behalf of the many people in Russia who increasingly are finding the courage to peacefully demand greater freedom, accountability, and rule of law in Russia.

This of course while he demands a life sentence or the death penalty for those like Snowden who are “finding the courage to peacefully demand greater freedom, accountability, and rule of law” in the United States.McCain is a man totally driven by ideology.

He has made his career promoting a messianic vision of the US as the one indispensable nation which is destined to dictate to the rest of the world how it should live and what kind of government it is to be allowed. He seeks to re-start the Cold War but in fact he himself resembles a Soviet commissar. His bluster and threats do grave harm to the United States and serve only to stiffen worldwide opinion against Americans and US foreign policy. He is but one US senator and he speaks only for himself, but somehow his destructive positions are given weight far out of proportion to his actual position in the US government.

Hopefully, someday he will be granted the shunning he deserves.

WHL wrote:McCain is almost as bad as Obama.

McCain, who I've spoken to—in Wolfeboro...a big disappointment...

 

WHL wrote:The Russians are demanding greater freedom?  Something that we are not doing here.  Why doesn't he see that we are losing our freedoms here every day?

The Russians are kicking out their Illegals, and quashing homosexual solicitations.

Where are they going to send them?

 

WHL wrote:McCain is almost as bad as Obama.

'Looks like he is covering for Obama / Hillary at Benghazi: read from the middle of the page.

Excerpt:

[quote]"...The lack of information and pressure to silence CIA operatives is disturbing to U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf, whose district includes CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.

“I think it is a form of a cover-up, and I think it’s an attempt to push it under the rug, and I think the American people are feeling the same way,” said the Republican.

“We should have the people who were on the scene come in, testify under oath, do it publicly, and lay it out. And there really isn’t any national security issue involved with regards to that,” he said.

Wolf has repeatedly gone to the House floor, asking for a select committee to be set up, a Watergate-style probe involving several intelligence committee investigators assigned to get to the bottom of the failures that took place in Benghazi, and find out just what the State Department and CIA were doing there. [...] In the aftermath of the attack, Wolf said he was contacted by people closely tied with CIA operatives and contractors who wanted to talk.

Then suddenly, there was silence.

“Initially they were not afraid to come forward. They wanted the opportunity, and they wanted to be subpoenaed, because if you’re subpoenaed, it sort of protects you, you’re forced to come before Congress. Now that’s all changed,” said Wolf.

Lawmakers also want to about know the weapons in Libya, and what happened to them..."


http://theconservativetreehouse.com/2013/08/02/benghazi-cutting-through-the-smoke-and-understanding-why-john-mccain-is-covering-for-the-president/

LOL - Ask Ed Snowden how that whole "whistleblowing" thing worked out for him.

Convinced yet, that Snowden is the underlying reason for Putin’s recent aggressive behavior?




.

News Hawk wrote:Convinced yet, that Snowden is the underlying reason for Putin’s recent aggressive behavior?

I thought that was Obama's fault?

No, the answer to your question is no.