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Comment by ciarannolan | Hacker News Reader

If granted a pardon by the current or future US president, is there any chance that Russia will not let him return home?

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Considering that this is mostly about Russia doing a victory lap, I don't think so.

If they tried to keep him there it would kind of spoil the whole thing and tip the lie of their supposed benevolence.

Much better for the PR to let him go and wish him luck. Probably even have a send off ceremony, give him some kind of medal?

Right. I don't think they'd want to waste the "good will" and good guy PR they got by protecting a US citizen from his own government.

Russia doesn't prevent it's citizens from traveling. What prevents it's citizens from traveling is getting a VISA to the destination country. This is granted through the local Embassy or Consolidate of destination country requiring a VISA.

Permanent residency is not citizenship. Granting Permanent Residency will give him some sort of stability knowing he will not have to renew his status every year (or so) and be able to participate more fully in Russian society (ex: Employment, services, travel, Pension, etc).

Edward Snowden will always be a US Citizen in the eyes of the USA unless he takes steps to renounce his citizenship.

That's not strictly true. In Russia, unlike US or Europe, you have to show your passport to leave the country, and you can be prevented from leaving by court order.

I can absolutely assure you that in each and every European country the person leaving must show his/her passport.

This might be a valid statement for leaving the EU and US by land in some places of high trust (Switzerland, Norway) but certainly not a general rule by all means and certainly not by any other means (sea/air/train) where your passport or ID will be checked by at least the airlines and other companies (who act as deputies of regulations) and it will be matched against passport validity databases and other various databases (no fly lists, wanted criminals, interpol ...). And I know of several (if not all) EU countries where you have to scan/show your passport to access the departures gates in Airports (into an automated gate that scans it). Some even require such scan just to enter the airport since the last wave of terrorist attacks in 2015-2016.

I think that's unknowable / up to the whims of Russia.

The only correct answer here.

Publicly Russia treated Snowden just as any (high-level) refugee, there is no value in keeping him in the country, and he himself didn't reveal any discomfort staying there. So there is no reason to believe they would interfere with his decisions.

In fact, if they granted him citizenship, then they might prevent him from traveling because he would become their responsibility in case he gets arrested abroad.

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