He's not a 'stateless person'. His passport has been revoked, but he remains a US citizen.
However if you read the context, what is being said is pretty much true: they are using citizenship as a weapon in order to deny him the human right to seek asylum.
"The Obama administration has now adopted the strategy
of using citizenship as a weapon. Although I am convicted
of nothing, it has unilaterally revoked my passport,
leaving me a stateless person. 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."
EDIT: Also, the concept of "a human right to seek asylum" is meaningless. Asylum is a two-party arrangement. Is that a legal obligation for all nations to _grant_ asylum to seekers, regardless of circumstances?
Justice: The quality of being fair and reasonable.
He is a fugitive from injustice.
I do not care whether he is a hero or not, but I do care about whether it was a right thing to do and whether he is treated as a human should be treated. These are principles worth upholding.
How so? I mean this sincerely.
What do you think will happen to him when he is arrested? There's no brig to throw him in, as he's a civilian. Snowden was very concerned about the lack of judicial oversight in what he saw with PRISM, so why would he assume that very same judicial system would mark him for special treatment when people like Hanssen, the Walker gang, and even Aaron Hernandez have not received such?
If Snowden really felt beforehand that the civilian justice system was so completely inequitable it seems weird that he'd have been so insistent on its involvement elsewhere.
The 'justice' system fulfils what power requires from it. It will be as inequitable with a trial as it has been with this whole fiasco.
"...But Obama’s Justice Department, like Bush’s, has not been above an opportunistic (and occasionally downright Procrustean) reading of particular statutes to permit whatever it is that the White House wants to do."
But I think underlying this is the thought that it would be good if there was an equitable justice system as opposed to an inequitable one.
The flipside for Snowden is that at least it will count as time served so if he gets sentenced to more than 2 years it might actually be beneficial as I'd imagine you get to meet with your lawyers more often while prepping for trial.
This, while seeming important, is basically irrelevant as long as the US is demonstrating their willingness to torture accused people prior to trial for crimes such as these.
He could have done something 10x worse and it still wouldn't matter. Nobody should ever be subjected to torture - even if convicted. They're torturing people for years before trials even start, if they start at all.
He cannot anticipate anything resembling justice in the US.
It's a red herring.
Exerting unknown influence behind closed doors with those who have the ability to grant or deny his requests for asylum is an entirely different matter, though.
"This kind of deception from a world leader is not justice, and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile"
Doesn't "exile" refer to his being without a passport? So isn't he clearly saying that it's extralegal?
Snowden would prefer not to find out if that trend is going to continue.
Hint: nobody has ever said they thought Manning was a suicide risk except for his torturers. All qualified medical personnel that have ever examined him (including the prison psychologist) have insisted that he wasn't. Hint 2: doing sleep deprivation and humiliation is not the way to reduce someone's chance of suicide, if you honestly believed they were a risk. Which no one did.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/12/01/1166253/-The-Tortur...
Additionally, Obama himself declared him (Manning) guilty in public before his trial even began. (I wish I was making this up.)
It's not speculation. We've watched it happen, and recently. They are condemned before the trial even begins, and denied basic human rights from the outset - rights we shouldn't even deny convicted mass murderers.
It's an incredible shame for everyone who used to be proud to be from the USA.
His treatment was bad enough that you don't have to be counter-factual about it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_Manning#Detention
Last time I checked May -> April was still 11 months, and definitely not "several years".
> Additionally, Obama himself declared him (Manning) guilty in public before his trial even began. (I wish I was making this up.)
As far as I can tell from Googling, he said in a conversation, in the context of the rule of law, the "he broke the law". And that was it.
Am I missing something?
The rest of the context from the sites Google finds seems to indicate that Manning can't possibly get a fair trial, because the officers who would have to decide his guilt would treat that as some kind of order. Which is simply untrue, as evidenced by Manning's own reaction by asking for a bench trial.
If he had asked for a jury trial he would have had many more people to possibly conceive of his innocence. And the jury pool would have contained enlisted members as well, not just officers.
By asking for a bench trial he's one, and only one, commissioned officer away from being found guilty. That would be an insane choice, if this officer were really that susceptible to finding Manning guilty simply because Obama failed to use the word "allegedly" in a conversation.
Luckily, as Manning realizes since he's actually in the freaking military, that isn't the case at all.
To your edit: See Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
"Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution"
Which is followed by:
"This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations"
Which negates your point, because of this:
http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/NEWS/A_U.S.%20new...
I don't understand what your point is about the nature of heroism.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights has no jurisdiction, it is not a law... If you are confusing it for one, then I think you have some reading to do.
> http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/NEWS/A_U.S.%20new....
Most political charges are dressed up as non-political. Does this surprise you?
> I don't understand what your point is about the nature of heroism
If your intent for bringing up heroism was not to imply that he should be "brought to justice", "turn himself in", "should not have run", or any variation of those, then consider my point about the nature of heroism to be an aside.
Snowden's own father says he broke the law... but he wasn't a traitor in doing so. But I don't believe the UDHR talks about treason in their exception request.
He broke the law, and fled to avoid justice. All quite reasonable, from his perspective.
But why is he trying to claim something different? He claims the U.S. pursuit of him is somehow extralegal or some kind of perversion of justice. It's neither.
Snowden decided that the need of the public to know about PRISM was more important than the loss of national security value that would come from revealing the details about it. While that's his decision to make, it's not weird that there are laws in place to protect national security. His father acknowledges that. Hell, even Putin acknowledges that; why can't Snowden now? If you're going to go on the lam then hey, I see why.... but don't act like the government did anything weird in that regard.
He is fleeing "justice", he believes that the US is using extralegal, political, methods to pursue him in order to "bring" him to justice, and he finds it plausible that "justice" will involve a gross violation of his human rights.
I am not seeing the problem here that you seem to think there is. What are you expecting him to say, "The only reason I am running is so that I am not subjected to a fair trail and humane punishment."?
He could just say "I broke the law for the public good, there's no way to get this issue the attention it deserves otherwise. I intend to remain free even if I have to be in exile, as that is how I can do the most good for the people!" etc etc. Not really that hard, you know. :P
No, it's a legal obligation to not infringe on the right of people to seek and enjoy asylum. Of course, it's the UN, so it's debatable how much of a "legal obligation" any of it is, especially for the USA.
Yes. This is what's wrong with this line of reasoning.
Only in the narrowest, most legalistic sense of the term. In terms of what is just however, I think there's a lot of room for debate.
This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes
Not that self-promotion or drama are necessarily bad things in his position. Both are most certainly things he's using to keep himself on the minds of as many people as possible for as long as he can.
This stretching of the truth does not engender trust.
"Exile means to be away from one's home (i.e. city, state or country), while either being explicitly refused permission to return and/or being threatened with imprisonment or death upon return." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exile
Before calling into question the truth of statements made by a public figure please look up the common definition.
Update:
Websters does not use this exact definition, being a more compact format than wikipedia, but if you look under the examples in Websters you will see "Many chose to live as exiles rather than face persecution." http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/exile
To argue that any person who cannot return to their home country without being arrested is "extralegally exiled" would mean that any fugitive is "extralegally exiled," an absurd result.
1. Threats Made by the US Government: Obama's statements such that Snowden is not worth the effort of an expensive extra-legal killing (“not going to be scrambling jets to get a 29-year-old hacker”) by a president that has engaged in many extra-legal killings, at least one against a US citizen, is a threat of extra-legal action. For instance if someone sent a letter that said "I'd kill you but you aren't worth the bullets" would be interpreted by many courts as a threat. Furthermore direct threats of extra-legal killing have been made by other members of the US government.
2. Prior Actions Against Snowden: The fact that Obama has attempted to use trade deals and threats to prevent Snowdens asylum appeals suggests that Obama and the US government is not willing to give Snowden a fair hearing since they are manipulating the international system of asylum to prevent him from getting a fair hearing internationally.
3.Prior Pattern of Action Against Other Whistle Blowers: Obamas illegal treatment of Bradley Manning is part of a pattern going back before Obama of illegal mistreatment of whistle blowers by the US government.
Given this evidence I would argue that the threat of extra-legal punishment is very much real and has been publicly communicated to all involved parties. The reality and communication of this threat to Snowden makes a very strong case for the claim that he has been extra-legally exiled.
If the charges are without merit then one of the very same judges that Snowden feels should be involved in these types of surveillance programs will throw them out.
Snowden's exile may very well be extralegal, but both the exile and the extralegality of it are on Snowden himself.
No, he's chosen to avoid the US explicitly to avoid torture.
There's nothing legal about that.
If so, I would think Snowden would have made that his moral priority to emphasize. There's no reason to fear "turnkey tyranny" (as he said) when we're already living in a torture regime, is there? In that case there's no key to turn, it's already here!
Torturing those who leak information prior to trial is something that the US government has already demonstrated a willingness to do. It's simply disgraceful - a national shame.
And why limit yourself to NSA whistleblowers, a government that has crossed this line has crossed that line in general, not just for some class. All this 'just NSA whistleblowers', 'just whistleblowers', 'just foreigners', 'just enemy combatants' and so on isn't fooling anybody.
Some lines you just don't cross, lest you become that which you claim to fight.
Because the claim isn't that "the USA has tortured people". The claim is that the USA will torture Snowden. Given the wide disparity in justice systems utilized for U.S. citizens, "enemy combatants", and U.S. military, you have to at least make that broad type of distinction to evaluate the probability of the claim that Snowden will be tortured if he returns.
There's no end to the things you can do or refuse to do if your only justification for that action (or lack thereof) is that a government has, at some time, tortured somebody somewhere.
I agree wholeheartedly that the U.S. needs to account for instances where they torture, but that also doesn't completely invalidate the whole government.
Because there are no bored, humorless Marines in charge of whatever Federal prison Snowden would end up in. I would surmise he should expect the same treatment as any other civilian accused of a Federal felony.
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/03/30/090330fa_fact_...
By the way you might have to click on "link" to reply; I think the thread nesting is too deep.
I hope I haven't given the impression that I think prolonged solitary confinement is acceptable. But I will say that the idea of someone as infamous as Snowden being put in solitary without actually trying to shank someone is implausible IMHO. Manning's supporters managed to get him transferred out of a military brig, after all, and Snowden's is a much more sympathetic case (with much more international attention to boot).
By the Wikipedia definition above every criminal who flees the country to avoid arrest is by definition in exile. Skipping town because you want to avoid a crime isn't being in exile, it is being on the run.
From Wikipedia: Exile means to be away from one's home (i.e. city, state or country), while either being explicitly refused permission to return and/or being threatened with imprisonment or death upon return.
And no, the use of the word "Torture" is not hyperbole in this case; no matter what technicalities you sugar coat it with; the US Government lacks all credibility on the issue of human rights at this time.
Whether you think he did a good thing or a bad thing, it's clear that Snowden is, by his own acknowledgment, guilty of multiple counts of serious felonies in the United States. The government is acting as expected, given this fact.
That the US government is acting as we might expect rather than allowing a congressional investigation into these clearly unconstitutional programs and the legal smokescreen that was designed to prevent any challenge to their legality; is not an advertisement for it's good faith towards the citizenry.
Yes, absolutely. Are there any English speakers who wouldn't?
Exile means to be away from one's home (i.e. city, state or country), while either being explicitly refused permission to return and/or being threatened with imprisonment or death upon return.
So he's probably not so much worried about whether or not he can return to the U.S., but rather what would happen to him when he did.
"Exile means to be away from one's home (i.e. city, state
or country), while either being explicitly refused
permission to return and/or being threatened with
imprisonment or death upon return." [0]
They haven't revoked his citizenship... just his passport. That doesn't remove citizenship, just the ability to travel abroad.
It's not self-imposed exile if returning to the US is a non-option due to their DEMONSTRATED TENDENCY to deny prisoners their basic human rights.
Still: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5974040
I think effectively it is a bad situation which has been created for him by the United States government. They are definitely manipulating his citizenship for their purposes whether you like the wording or not.
And this isn't about just being questioned. If he is extradited back to the US, expect a lot worse to happen to him...
What he has done is no doubt illegal, but it also strikes me as a positive thing. I disagree with people that say he is a fugitive from justice - I think it's very clear that he is a fugitive from injustice. He has shown us injustices from the US government - and now they wish to have him stand trial in order that they can lock him up for life, sentence him to death or torture him.
Is there a difference between Snowden and other criminals? Yes, Snowden has done the right thing.
He is under no obligation to make concessions to them by adopting terminology which they control.
It certifies his identity, not his rights. I'm not sure how you can suddenly claim it's not valid, without claiming that the original certification was found to be incorrect.
(just asking, IANAL, so maybe some technicalities elude me)
If Snowden is mistaken in using this terminology, he isn't the only one.