Snowden asylum still under review, stays in airport for now (opens in new tab)

Oh goddammit! I thought we were over Russia and the US doing that cold war bullshit.

Seriously, if you're going to fight a war fight an economic war, much less destructive to other people than the little proxy wars the big boys seems to love so much.

He _is_ cooperative. Inside, he claims we're under an attack of US spies or US propaganda, etc. But when it's time to act abroad, he is too weak to make anything substantial that would annoy the neocon US President.

Just as Italy replied to Snowden that he should have brought the request personally, our ministry of immigration finds excuses like "the procedure takes time..."

Also, when Putin says "don't release" he is NOT saying "don't give to me"....

For Putin harboring an "active" foreign dissident would make it just a little bit harder to make live less awesome for the internal dissidents. On the other side, giving protection from "evil" Americans to a young naive guy who is being too harshly pursued by the whole overwhelming force of the said Americans' government for possibly violating some obscure laws in order to defend and promote democracy and openness, etc.. - well, Putin looks almost like a good Samaritan (God forbid that Samaritan come to your help like he came for Snowden) and, by proxy, a democracy defender and promoter :)

But imagine he violates the requiements and releases more information. Would that actually be a problem for him?

Putin already said that he won't send him to a country where he may be sentenced to death. So even in that case, he probably won't be sent to the US but to some other country than grants asylum to him.

Yep. Got this from a live blog that Greenwald tweeted a little while ago.

"Federal migration service has not issued documents allowing Edward Snowden to leave the airport yet, there was a misinformation today in the media, said Kucherena."

http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_07_24/Edward-Snowden-leaves-Sher...

It's not quite possible, it's factual: http://rt.com/news/snowden-leaks-guardian-greenwald-264/

(well, maybe 'almost all' rather than 'all.')

Which is the right thing to do. Perhaps then people start paying more attention to the leaks instead of the messenger.

My guess is that Putin would be happy to have Snowden break the agreement, as long as he doesn't go to the press and take credit for it. Putin's government has been working constantly to undermine America's foreign influence, and these leaks go a long way towards doing that.

>Information may continue to leak, but not from Snowden. His part of the show is finished (and luckily for him, he's not even bruised!).

In my opinion, being exiled from your home and living the rest of your life with the world superpower ready to kidnap you is relatively bruising.

> Putin is a man of his word

:-)

meh. everything's temporary, technically. the line blurs between that and "not temporary"

> Much better than China anyway.

Why do you think Russia is a much better choice for him then China?

He's probably hoping that Iceland offers him asylum. Their bill granting him asylum wasn't denied, it just wasn't allowed to be voted on. So perhaps there's still faint hope for asylum in Iceland.

Germany should, as explained here: http://ind.pn/12ix0rD

But unfortunately it won't :-/

>can any one name one [...] perfect country

No.

He should buy a fake identity and go somewhere else, I'm sure fake passport is easy to get in Russia.

May be Vatican.

"My friend's friend is my friend" ironically enough.

In Soviet Russia, my friend is my enemy's enemy.

If you've ever been near a russian land border, you'd know sneaking ain't an option - they're still very much into their 30 foot razor wire fences, and mile wide minefields.

AFAIK, the only borders which aren't demarked as such are those which ramble across incredibly inhospitable desert, which serves the same purpose as razor wire and mines.

That's an over-simplistic view of things and implies that Snowden is perforce the lesser fool. I think it's rather more the reality that Snowden has been quite wise in his planning: he is aware that he is putting Russia in a position where Russia will try its darndest to be on its best behavior in sustaining that "asylum-giving, human-rights protecting" image it has recently gotten.

Can't agree more (Russian here). In Russia it's all about putting up a show of anti-americanism, because that's what the voters like (the one thing that brings back memories of relative security of late Soviet days). Think Osama bin Laden granting asylum to Snowden in some remote Taliban camp.

Exactly, imagine how the situation would've played out if Snowden were gay (or a woman).

It's safe to assume that most of us accepted that the mass surveillance programs existed. This doesn't diminish the importance of what Snowden did.

It was more of an emperor-has-no-clothes moment than some unexpected, shocking revelation. It forced a lot of people to stop avoiding the problem and to actually start talking about it openly.

Classic joke, even more true today: "How do you know when a politician is lying? He opens his mouth."

Why?

He is no threat to Russia or Putin what so ever. All the information he has is out or in the hands of others. On top of that, Putin is hardly likely to do anything to him apart from send him to the US as some sort of present, since the worlds media will be watching.

Seem to me a lot of this FSB ownership stuff is prejudiced (pre-judged) scare mongering, and simply designed to undermine Snowden and his actions.

I see no reason for the FSB to "control" Snowden at all. Monitor, of course, but who wouldn't? Even if the UK gave him asylum, we'd monitor his whereabouts.

I think I'd rather do 2 years at Club Fed in the US than be under FSB control in Russia. I mean, Putin straight kills journalists.

What's the difference?

Oh, I meant that Snowden can't disclose any further information about the NSA, which was given as a condition by Russia if Snowden wants Russian asylum.

I wonder if the non-disclosure is also for the Russians.

Quoting Reuters. As far as I understand, Greenwald wouldn't make an aricle that would just involve tracking Snowden's steps like it would of some celebrity. It's exactly the distraction of talking about the messenger instead of the message.

He and other writers at the Guardian have written about Snowden on multiple occasions. I haven't seen any other news outlets reporting that Snowden has been cleared or is on the verge of being cleared.

Edit: I just found some additional sources.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/07/24/us-russia-snowden-...

http://www.businessinsider.com/report-edward-snowden-is-now-...

In an ironic twist of fate, living like Josh Harris, with cameras live streaming him 24/7 from now on might keep him safe.

Well, you can easily make it a direct flight. I have no idea how much hiring a pilot and a plane capable of crossing the pacific non-stop costs, but it's probably well within his (or his supporters) means.

By complicated I mainly meant the countries he does not have to fly over.

Just want to point out that Russia just passed a law banning "gay propaganda" -- their term for saying anything true or positive about homosexuality. The CURRENT government. Signed by Putin. Passed unanimously by the parliament. Did you ignore that fact because you support that law and don't consider it a violation of human rights?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/11/russia-law-banni...

And black people are certainly still widely discriminated against and treated unfairly in the United States. Have you ever heard of Trayvon Martin? The incarceration rates of blacks versus whites? The Republican Party? Its leader, Rush Limbaugh? Voter suppression? The Southern Strategy? I could go on and on. Do you believe that racism is no longer an issue in the United States, because your glorious leader Rush Limbaugh told you so?

Are you saying he's have the same level of insight if he was from Saskatchewan, Canada?

Kim Philby spied for political reasons, not for money as were most spies who fled to USSR. They all got KGB pensions and medals.

Snowden has been accompanied by Sarah Harrison of WikiLeaks. He is not alone and isolated with Russians.