NSA leaker Edward Snowden boarded a plane in Hong Kong bound for Russia earlier today after the U.S. filed "sealed" charges against him under the Espionage Act and issued an order to Hong Kong officials to extradite him back to the U.S. to face charges the U.S. government will not make public because the Court in which the charges were filed operates in complete secrecy in violation of the U.S. Constitution. Hong Kong officials say the extradition request from the U.S. did not fully comply with their law so he was permitted to leave the country.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier he would consider a grant of asylum to Snowden, but Snowden's final destination will reportedly take him to Venezuela by way of Cuba. The Associated Press, quoting from a Tass news report, says Snowden would fly from Russia to Cuba and then to Caracas, Venezuela.
Another case of US government agencies ignoring the law, and wanting to continue operating in secret. Both Bradley Manning and Ed Snowden are accused of blabbing classified information, yet the details of what they blabbed, used as evidence against them, are sealed at the request of the government. If the information has already been blabbed, what is the purpose of sealing it? And why do the judges in these courts go along with that idea?
ReplyDeleteSnowden has good reason to run. I never thought I would see the US trying to justify torture, i.e. water boarding, and other enhanced interrogation techniques. I never thought I would see the US use Extra-Ordinary Rendition.
ReplyDeleteAs a side bar it interesting how the Mega-Media, the White House, and Congress has ignored the Privatization of Intelligence. How is it that they place the gathering of intelligence into the hands of a "profit driven" system. A system that would need to find constant threats to justify their existence.