NSA critics Ilija Trojanov: German writer must not enter the U.S.
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NSA critic Ilija Trojanow: German writer not allowed to enter US
Despite an invitation to a conference, german writer Ilija Trojanow was denied entry to the US - without reasoning. In the past, Trojanow signed a petition of protest against NSA surveillance.
Hamburg - Writer Juli Zeh broke the news: Through Facebook, she passed on a message from her college Ilija Trojanow. According to it, Trojanow was denied entry into the US. "He's marrooned at the airport in Brasil and can't participate in a conference on german studies in the US", said Zeh.
Ilija Trojanows' publisher Hanser confirmed this account upon request from Spiegel Online. Trojanows reported monday evening via SMS from Brasil "I was denied entry into the US today. Will be an arduous journey home".
Juli Zeh linked the denial of entry with a protest against NSA surveillance she initiated. Zeh presented the german chancellery a petition with 65000 signatures on september 18.
Trojanow was not present at the presentation, but he was one of the first signees, the Schöffling publisher coordinators told Spiegel Online. The writers alluded to a "historic attack on our democratic state under the rule of law".
"Let's frame it in a positive light: Our commitment makes an impact. It is being noticed", writes Zeh on Facebook on the entry ban to her "friend and fellow activist". Zeh and Trojanow wrote a non-fiction book on internet surveillance called "attack on freedom" in 2009. Zeh continues: "Let's frame in a negative light: it's a farce. Pure paranoia. People sticking up for civil liberties are treated like public enemies". In the comments on her posting Zeh emphasizes that Trojanows' ESTA application was answered positively, so in her opinion there can't be a problem with his visa or a work permit issue.
Ilija Trojanow, born 1965 in Bulgaria and escaped to Germany in 1971, received the Leipzig Book Fair Prize 2006 for his adventure novel "Der Weltensammler" (The Collector of Worlds). He held a honorific speech for nobel laureate Herta Müller at the Franz-Werfel human rights award. He was in Salvador de Bahia on invitation from the Goethe institute. He was supposed to talk about his latest novel "EisTau" (IceDew) on a conference of the German Studies Association in Denver.
(Edit: congress -> conference)
I wonder whats next in this hollywood movie. Drone strike in central london to take out an embassy? A firewall blockade directed at news paper articles? Secret kill lists and torture?
Maybe someone should sneak a telepresence robot to congress, give it a dark trench coat and a code name. This is Truth Teller congress members, let the robot speak!
No, not THE congress. The original article means a convention/conference.
I guess visiting speakers should always have a backup plan, and be able to do a video conference stream from the airport directly to the conference. That is if they are allowed to keep their electronics equipment intact at the border, which I guess is doubtful. Maybe a prerecorded speech?
In the long term moves like this can't be good for the US.
Of course it is. Always the effect on you "as a US Citizen". Because that's the only way you can think. What about the rest of the World?
Are you not a "World citizen" too?
Think about this for a moment. Is your economy really your biggest concern? What is the US doing to the rest of the world? Do you disapprove of this behaviour just because of the effect it might have on you, economically? Of course it is a reason, but is it really the first and foremost reason? When you look at it in the light of what the US is actually doing in your name?
You do realize that when you write things like this you post them in front of an international audience, right?
I'm not singling you out, I see this attitude everywhere. In particular in regard to the blatant spying and thrashing of our privacy. If it's your privacy it is an outrage, if it's everybody else's privacy it is "expected".
I just can't understand this attitude. If my country would be engaging in such behaviour, in my name, I would strongly denounce it because it is wrong to treat people like this regardless of where they live! Sure I might think "huh this could be bad for trade-relations of the Netherlands, and we're a trade country", but not for a single moment would I consider this a major reason to fault those actions. It is wrong because you should not treat people that way.
Like, what you just said is basically, if this couldn't hurt you economically, it would be much less of a concern to you. Because economically is your biggest concern. So all the other concerns must be so much smaller.
Hm.
How nice.
Say that to my face?
The rest of your points are pretty good and they are well taken. It is possible that U.S. citizens generally view ourselves less as "World citizens" than we should. For me, personally, I feel like this is because we have (largely through our own past mistakes!) made many enemies throughout the world, and I struggle to feel like there is any useful world citizenship that includes both me and those enemies. So yes, it royally pisses me off that you in the Netherlands are being spied on, and that German writers are being mistreated, and that European embassies are being bugged, all in my name, but no, it really doesn't bother me that we are spying on the North Koreans. I'm mad that we don't seem to know our friends from our enemies and are embarrassing ourselves by just drag-netting everything, but from a legal standpoint, within my own government, I think there is a useful line between U.S. citizens, and non-citizens.
For what it's worth, I absolutely think that I belong on the other side of that line for you in the Netherlands, and if I found out your government was spying on me, I would be more upset with my own government for failing to protect me than with your government for the spying.
I'm sure none of that made you like me or other Americans any more, which bums me out, and I wish there were a big happy World family for me to feel a part of, but as far as I can tell, there isn't.
And I do like many/most Americans that I've met, it's just that the discourse on this subject on HN had started feeling a little bit one-sided. As I said, I wasn't trying to single you out, it was something that had been bubbling under my skin for a while now (and others too).
For what it's worth, if my government was spying in NK, the way yours is intercepting, recording, cataloguing and datamining the lives of all (Internet/technology-using) humans on this planet, I would in fact not be okay with this. Because it's no way to treat people, anywhere. As we've seen every single time, just because something that is actually wrong seems justifiable, doesn't mean it should be done because it'll just lower the threshold for it to be used again in situations where you wouldn't agree with it. Because you can't close that door, you can't say "I trust your judgement, this time", because in a few years it'll be somebody else making that call, and the machinery is already there.
Of course irony has it that not even the US gov is spying on NK in that manner, because they can't really get a useful intelligence foothold in that place. So the comparison doesn't actually quite work, because they're doing all this very deep hard-core intercepting/recording/datamining on pretty much all places except NK, and a few others that you might consider "justified". Why is it that the places where they far exceeded the boundaries of what can be reasoned as "justifiable intelligence" are in fact not the places where it might actually matter? Because they were allies. The UK hacked Belgium, FFS! It is an abuse of trust. For what, for nothing, well I'm guessing for business intelligence.
So yeah, that's a bit of a conundrum. With "national security" and all. Some tough choices maybe? But really, nobody said it would be easy. If you're dealing in global politics, affecting the lives of billions of people all over the world, all with different attitudes and beliefs, that's what you're signing up for. And there is no easy way out, 100% "Total Information Awareness" isn't a solution, for similar reasons as "let's bomb the ever-loving shit out of everybody" is not (as the US seems to be slowly learning).
See, the Dutch NSA, called AIVD, is doing just as bad. At some point they were tapping more phones than the US. If you buy Bitcoin you're on a list. They are already tracking our locations via the cellphones and "invisible text messages" and "Bob" knows what. It's pretty bad. But they're doing it to just these 17M people and it's our problem. This is why I donate money to Bits of Freedom, which is like the Dutch version of the EFF. One thing they're very good at, is informing politicians what all this new-fangled technology can do, so they can make better choices. So I hope B.o.F. can put some brakes on that. However, if my government were to turn its eyes outward, and decide it can just invade and intercept the personal lives of, well, anybody guilty of the crime of not being a Dutch citizen, I'd damn well be outraged, and expect my gov to cut it the hell out. ("Some of my best friends aren't Dutch citizens!!", Americans, in fact). And I'd demand that even though B.o.F. is a Dutch foundation, they'll work to put a stop to that as well even if it doesn't directly affect Dutch citizens.
Because, really, should allies have to be protecting their citizens from each other? Well they should protect their citizens, that's one thing a government is for, but ostensibly the point of having allies is that you're not trying to screw one another over.
Okay, and sorry this is getting a bit long, but I must point out that it is in fact more complicated than this :) Now it seems like I say just the US is screwing over its allies (and I also said the UK was). But part of the reality of the situation is also that many of these both-heavily-spied-upon-as-well-as-allied countries, are in fact governments screwing over their own citizens, with agreements that say basically "you spy on my back, I'll spy on yours". Which is another reason why you need to look past your own boundaries instead of asking/expecting your gov to better protect just your privacy. Because they don't really want to. And they use the excuse of spying on other countries as a distraction. As has been pointed out many times already, in the US there's some things in your Constitution that says, if anyone was listening, roughly that they shouldn't spy on US citizens for no good reason. That is why they have the deals with other countries, we can't legally spy on our own people, so you spy on ours, we spy on yours, deal? (this has been the case since ECHELON, it's right there on Wikipedia).
And THAT, is why you should not just expect your government to protect you from the other spying eyes, but why you should demand that they stop the type of intrusive surveillance / intercepting / recording / datamining they're doing to others as well. Because you're not alone in this world. Or, if only, to view from an economical perspective again, it removes the bargaining chip, if they don't have the deep intelligence on their "allies" they cannot trade it back for the deep intelligence that they are legally prohibited from gathering on their own citizens.
States each have their own legislatures and can be referred to as "the state legislature of X" or "X state legislature". But they all have their own names, New York's is called the New York State Assembly. California simply calls theirs the California State Legislature. Either way works.
That's already the case...
Good to know, but I already signed a petition months ago. So no Yellowstone or Grand Canyon for me anytime soon.
I wonder when they will start rejecting US citizens on flights within the US based on petitions signed.
*Some restrictions apply.
"Get Your Shit Together 2013"
Anyway, they had paid for their tickets to the US, crossed the ocean, were stopped and sent back (at their own cost of course, I bet travel insurance didn't cover this).
Sorry that I don't have the link to this story.
I told him, I wouldnt feel safe traveling to USA, my possessions are at risk of appropriation and "borrowing" for an extended period of time. They could even send me to Gitmo for no apparent reason, or even if they had a reason, I still wouldnt receive a fair trial, just like in those countries, Saudi Arabia or Iran.
I actually felt and still feel the US could just put me in a black bag in a bathtub and nobody would care. No way my money is going to support such a regime. Never.
For decades people who were members of foreign political parties deemed "too left wing", were often routinely denied all kinds of visas, for example.
What exactly the US government considers thought-crimes worthy of visa refusals have changed over the years, but the use of visa refusals as a tool to restrict access to government critical foreigners has been a constant.
How exactly do the parents examples of being a left-wing, gay or anti-apartheid activist seem severe to you?
He was denied entry without explanation. That this has anything to do with some petition he signed at some point seems a bit far fetched.
Also: A positive ESTA application doesn't mean anything. For Germans on the visa waiver, ESTA is just a quick online transaction that is good for several years. It doesn't actually mean that there aren't "any problems with the visa or work permit".
If he doesn't have a German passport (came to Germany in 1971 with his parents from Bulgaria), I can see why somebody from Bulgaria coming to the US from Brazil might seem a bit strange.
So far, this is all speculation and really not worth the read.
Sorry, I don't. What qualifies as "strange"? Is that an official term? There are loads of people who travel via countries they don't live in. There are also many people who were born in countries that don't exist anymore - how strange is that?
But I repeatedly tried to print my boarding pass online in advance and check in using machines at the airport. In London that always went smoothly. At SFO, it almost always caused me to be referred to the ticket counters due to some undefined "problem". The staff were equally baffled every time, and the only thing they could come up with was that the system flagged me because I was travelling to England with no onward ticket and no visa (don't need one, as Norway is in the EEA which gives me the same residency rights in the UK as EU citizens) - they at least claimed that their systems did not give them any reason.
Mine was just a minor hassle, but I would be surprised if the systems "score" people based on tiny little unexpected deviations from the norm like that for various additional levels of attention. (I still printed the boarding passes every time, as whenever I couldn't check in, all I needed to do was look a bit baffled and walk over to the premium checkin and they'd get me processed very quickly)
and the only thing they could come up with was that the system flagged me because I was travelling to England with no onward ticket
When you fly from Zurich, you need to show your passport to leave the Schengen part of the airport and in addition there are strict controls at the gates for UK bound flights, where your id is checked again.
Contrast this to flights within the Schengen room, where you scan your boarding pass (mobile, home printed, or airline issued) at a couple of automatic gates and you're in the plane. No id at all required.
From what I've read it's more and more the case that countries use airlines as cops to deny entry at the point of origin. If somebody with invalid travel documents, or missing visa gets onto the flight the airline can be heavily fined.
http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/buecher/autoren/ilija-...
So it was at the Brazilian airport and American Airlines had something pop up on the screen when checking his passport and after some disappearance told him that he isn't allowed to board.
That's an understatement - together with Juli Zeh he's co-authored a book about the surveillance state, has published numerous essays criticizing the US in Germany, he also didn't sign that petition, he _co-initiated_ it.
I-94 F: "Have you ever been denied a U.S. visa or entry into the U.S. or had a U.S. visa cancelled? If yes, when? ______________________ where?"[1]
Last year his work visa was at first denied. And only granted after intervention by the Washington University St. Louis.: "Schon vergangenes Jahr hatte das amerikanische Konsulat in München meinen Antrag auf ein Arbeitsvisum zum Zwecke einer Gastprofessur an der Washington University in St. Louis zuerst negativ beschieden und erst nach Protesten der Universität und einer erheblichen Verzögerung, die einen Teil des Semesters nutzlos vergehen ließ, das Visum erteilt."[2]
So possible simple explanation could be:
He assumed his visa was not denied and answered question F with NO, since he got one, but that didn't match up with the a possible record of his denied visa application. So his entry could arguably be denied on formal grounds only. Still bad style on not giving him any clue what went wrong. This would tell more about a bureaucracy state than a looming surveillance state, yet the two are not exclusive to each other.
Quite likely he also would have gotten in with an actual Tourist or Business Visa (B-1/B-2)[3], once approved they are way harder to revoke instead of relying on an over-automated process like Visa-Waiver/ESTA if you would have any unclear answers on an I94.
[1]http://forms.cbp.gov/pdf/visa_waiver.pdf
[2]http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/buecher/autoren/ilija-...
Visas have been denied from communists, peace activists, greens, anti-apartheid activists and homosexuals in previous decades. Surveillance critics fit this group just fine.
The national interest of the US is congruent with the interests of the NSA?
An interesting point of view, but not one I think you'd find majority support for in the US or elsewhere.
You are confusing political opinions to the workings of US government.
Same as with the right not to be spied upon, really. Sad...
It seems circumscribed, if that Wikipedia article is correct. Blasphemy laws are one worrying aspect.
On the other hand, I'd rather have even that constitutional guarantee instead of the complete lack of any guaranteed freedom of speech that is the situation in the UK.
And at the border the majority of your rights are suspended anyway.
The answer is has many faces - until you have entered any country you are not subject to the full jurisdiction there - Snowden was not having full rights in Moscow for the months he spent at the terminal. He was also not having full obligations - in Russia you need to register with the police as a foreigner and generally help them keep track of you when you switch your residence. So even as a US citizen while on the border you are not in the US fully.
The second is that the Supreme Court has balanced the rights and obligations of the government (the right to refuse entry and the duty to protect the country) and has determined that it is greater than the rights given by the fourth amendment.
Isn't this a fairly recent phenomena, and predicated on dubious legal grounds? In any case, this sort of thing can only survive because people accept it (and perhaps because they may be careful not to harass influential people).
That has always been the case with the US "right to privacy". The Snowden leaks have caused a fuss (in the USA) because it's the US Government spying on US citizens in the USA. Us foreigners have always been spied on.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
The US goes to war to bring 'democracy' to foreign lands, but at the same time it doesn't think it's appropriate to follow it's own principles with regard to it's treatment of foreigners (and their data) at home.
Not saying right or wrong, just how the system works.
To foreigners and law layman it often seems that the wording of the U.S. constitution means Human Rights but that has often turned out not to be the case and those are more understood as Civil Rights. Personally I have the feeling that there are no Human Rights in the U.S. given what we know about Guantanamo and NSA surveillance but I'd like to hear a more knowledgeable opinion about that.
But, yes, some countries enforce their laws on companies there that deal with anyone. If you're not in the USA or Canada and have a Facebook account, Facebook is bound by Irish Data Protection (i.e. privacy) law. You, as a non-Irish citizen, or resident, talk to the Irish Data Protection Commissioner and get them to enforce your rights. And Austrian person did just that: http://europe-v-facebook.org/EN/en.html
Additionally in the UK, you are entitled to some forms of free medical care from the NHS, even if you're a non-UK resident just visiting: http://www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/AboutNHSservices/uk-visitors/Pa...
So no, not all systems work like the US system.
Probably.
Regardless of what you think of the immigration process in the US, many people misuse tourist visas to overstay/work.
The CBP often turn away people if they are suspicious that they might over stay their visa or commit other kinds of immigration fraud.
I just don't know if this person was turned away like many other people and is raising a stink because they have some star power (and think they should be treated specially).
Again, this is independent of how open you think borders should be, because then it comes under a different headline.
Apparently he had already been denied a work visa without explanation last year by the US consulate in Munich. However, that decision was apparently later reversed after protests from Washington University in St. Louis. Since that must have been before the Snowden leaks and NSA protests, I'd say it doubtful if those are really connected to his more recent refusal of entry.
Edit: To be clear, I am not suggesting that his refusal was not politically motivated. But the original article suggests (or rather quotes author Juli Zeh on suggesting) a direct connection to the NSA protests and their petition against NSA surveillance.
Yet US is no difference. And there is countless other examples.
I am going to be very brave and say this. Americans, you cant blame people in other parts of the world hate you.
Additionally, it states there are a lot of restrictions for using the visa waiver program that I imagine someone like him might object to, see the list below:
https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov/esta/WebHelp/ESTA_Screen-Level_Onli...
It sounds like they need biometrics, and there are all kinds of restrictions on duration, destination, etc. is this program like TSA Pre in that it's seen as a "privilege" program in lue of getting an actual VIsa?
I'm not saying this wasn't done for political reasons, but before we all jump to that conclusion is it possible this program, EStA, is just a mess of requirements that only works for people that fit a narrow definition of excluded? Again, just looking at the requirements it looks pretty stringent and it sounds like this is an alternative to a visa program. Reading the article on FAZ
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3...
it sounds like American Airlines told him his option was to get a Visa. Is it possible that's what really happened here, and the leap to blaming this on the NSA is unwarranted?
It certainly would be easier if you could just find out what the reason was for all this from a independent source.
TL;DR: don’t get screwed.
If the computer says, 'deny' you're done.
It has been used against communists, peace activists, anti-apartheid activists, greens and homosexuals in previous decades. Now it's surveillance critics who don't get in.
Sure there is. An (apparently) peaceful person from a friendly country was banned simply because she led an Internet signature campaign against a clandestine and borderline-rogue surveillance agency. How many other HNers would have signed a similar petition?
> Prior criminal convictions, affiliation with unsuitable political parties or organizations or poor character are valid justifications for denying entry according to US law
I don't see any of those being applicable in this case, at least as per the article.
When intelligent, well-informed and progressive citizens reach the point that they don't see anything wrong in a government/regime trying to muzzle critics, simply because they can and they have done so in the past, we implicitly grant approval to the continuation of such tactics.
The first step towards solving a problem is acknowledging you have one.
>borderline-rogue surveillance agency
That's not the opinion of the government. It's the job of the people to change the policy of the government. NSA surveillance is government run activity and foreigners speaking against it can be denied visa.
As forefinger I find the naivety of US citizens towards their government disturbing. NSA is not borderline-rogue as long as the White House and the Congress are on the same boat.
They are in flagrant, publicized violation of the Fourth Amendment (rogue) with only a subtle, borderling rationalization keeping them from being wiped out by congress "we won't used the mined data/results-of-unreasonable-search until we need it". The amendments being, as you may recall, agreements leveraged by the states to prevent an out-of-control federal government.
Remember, the colonies didn't need the feds as much as the feds needed the states. it has a hard sell, and without protections like the Fourth Amendment, it ain't worth it for states to be part of the nation.
For the record, Ilija Trojanov is a "he"