The Edward Snowden Affair (17 page)

The
Global Times
, a pro-party newspaper, issued a call to arms as it vehemently condemned American foreign surveillance while periodically lapsing into hypocrisy. The daily stopped short of referring to America as a corporatocracy, wherein corporations are the governing bodies. Instead it announced that the division between American business and U.S. government had become indistinguishable, “Along with the expansion of American Internet barons which have extremely close relations with Washington, the ownership the Internet is now being used by Washington to serve its own interests. Snowden sounded the alarm, and we cannot cover our ears.” It lambasted American capitalism for having failed as an ideology, after making its inevitable plunge into a dictatorship: “Washington keeps a firm grip of the Internet where it abuses its power. But other countries are not united in fighting US hegemony in cyberspace.”
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The Sinocism China Newsletter
outlined the possible economic implications of U.S. intelligence’s intrusive international surveillance: “If [Mark] Zuckerberg [the CEO of Facebook] had any remaining shred of hope that Facebook could come to China, he can kiss it goodbye thanks to Snowden.”
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By willfully hand-delivering proof of America’s hypocrisy, the Chinese equivalent to Twitter, Sina Weibo, exploded with applause for Snowden. Many commentators believed the NSA leaker’s Eastern approval was due to the hope that he might inspire one of their own in mainland China to tear down the Great Firewall of Internet censorship and surveillance. One Weibo user, nicknamed “Pretending to be in New York,” highlighted the irony of Snowden being in China and the two countries’ paradoxical political positions: “If Snowden were a Chinese citizen, 1) Hong Kong would agree to hand him over to the Chinese government; 2) the US would hail him as hero and then try to rescue him immediately; 3) his name would become a ‘sensitive word’ on the social media in China and all discussions related would be banned; 4) [o]ver a thrilling struggle, he would finally board the airplane to New York; 5) people would acclaim the escape on the social media in China; 6) New York University would invite him to be a visiting scholar.” Another user named Leigh Chiang sardonically noted, “It looks like Obama has been assimilated by a certain political party (Communist Party of China).”
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People took to the streets of Hong Kong, and protests were staged at the U.S. Consulate.
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But it was semi-autonomous Hong Kong which filled its headlines with Snowden; barring a few exceptions such as
Global Times
and
The Sinocism China Newsletter
(the latter is edited by an American living in Beijing), mainland China largely ignored him, for fear it would incite domestic upheaval.

Snowden told the
SCMP
, “My intention is to ask the courts and people of Hong Kong to decide my fate. I have had many opportunities to flee Hong Kong, but I would rather stay and fight the United States government in the courts, because I have faith in Hong Kong’s rule of law.” He was subtly informing Hong Kong, and consequently the world, that he was prepared to use the local court system to his advantage should the need arise. Snowden could stay 90 days on his visa.
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It was confirmed he was working with human rights attorneys Robert Tibbo, Albert Ho and Jonathan Man, the latter two of Ho, Tse, Wai & Partners. Tibbo and Man had a history of battling extradition proceedings.
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They had attempted to sue Hong Kong for detaining then extraditing Sami al-Saadi in 2004. Their client had cited fear of unfair treatment and abuse at the hands of dictator Muammar Gaddafi if he were returned to Tripoli.
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On June 19, a WikiLeaks consulting team arrived in Hong Kong to further aid Snowden.
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During their discussions, as he had with Poitras and Greenwald, Snowden insisted all parties remove their cell batteries and place their phones in a refrigerator.
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Snowden was aware that for deportation to occur, the U.S. would have to make a convincing case. It needed to find equivalent charges in the country’s extradition agreement.
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If it could not, Hong Kong would be unable to consider him a criminal for an act it didn’t consider illegal. Both countries had espionage laws, and “unlawful use of computers” was included in the treaty. The U.S. knew regardless of what ensued, Snowden would appeal his detention, which would force his case to be heard before he could be lawfully extradited. The process could take months, if not years. Washington’s greatest concern was that he make a bid for asylum citing the fear of abuse by U.S. authorities. Fellow whistleblower Bradley Manning had already filed this complaint. While waiting trial, he was placed in solitary confinement in Quantico, Virginia. He reported inhumane treatment at the hands of his guards.
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On June 14, a day after the
SCMP
reports that the U.S. had hacked Chinese University, a federal court signs and seals charges against Snowden.
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It is accompanied by an arrest warrant.

On June 15, the American government quietly asks for Snowden to be provisionally arrested and detained. A provisional arrest expedites the detainment proceedings and supersedes the need for a standard arrest, which can only be executed after the charges have been recognized by the host country.

On June 17, Washington anxiously inquires as to why Hong Kong had not met its demands. Hong Kong responds that the matter is still “under review.”

On June 19, as disclosures continue to appear, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder places a personal call to Hong Kong Secretary for Justice Rimsky Yuen. He pleads for Hong Kong to detain Snowden.

On June 21, as the sealed charges are made public, citing Snowden with theft, “unauthorized communication of national defense information” and “willful communication of classified communications intelligence information to an unauthorized person,” Hong Kong finally responds to Washington. It asks for more details concerning Snowden’s case.
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Washington made several mistakes while attempting to convince Hong Kong to surrender the whistleblower. The most obvious blunder was listing Snowden’s middle name as “James” instead of “Joseph” on a number of officially submitted papers. The Justice Department had also failed to include his passport number.
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The paperwork was rushed because Washington arrogantly assumed where the request was coming from was justification enough. It had failed to explain “how two of the three charges the US mentioned in its arrest request fell within the scope of a US-Hong Kong rendition of fugitive offenders agreement signed in 1996.”
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This undoubtedly refers to the latter two charges which Snowden himself had predicted would be the U.S. government’s vital misstep. During his June 9 interview with Greenwald and MacAskill, he said, “But I don’t think I have committed a crime outside the domain of the U.S. I think it will be clearly shown to be political in nature.”
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By including espionage charges instead of merely indicting him on theft, the U.S. permitted Hong Kong to argue Washington’s motive was political as opposed to strictly criminal. This automatically placed Snowden in debatable refugee status. To cover all of its bases, Washington would have had to request that Interpol issue a Red Notice for Snowden. Interpol is the world’s police agency, and a Red Notice would force 190 countries’ airports to stop Snowden’s departure. Though an Interpol official later commented that the agency would have been unable to act upon an alleged political crime, the symbolic gesture by the U.S. would have nonetheless reinforced how severe the charges put to Snowden were.
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When requesting further details about the charges, which Washington vainly denied having ever received,
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Hong Kong also asked the U.S. to address claims of hacking as reported by the SCMP.
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At this juncture, the United States should have read between the lines. It wasn’t getting Snowden back.

Snowden left China because the country’s officials knew that when Washington didn’t immediately respond to the request for more detailed information about the American exile, the Capitol was up to something. The U.S. government was unwilling to content itself with Hong Kong playing political opossum, so the Justice Department changed tactics. It was going to pin Snowden down and then bury China in paperwork until it submitted.

The U.S. was planning to revoke Snowden’s passport. China anticipated this and tipped him off.

On June 22, Snowden’s passport is revoked.
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Though Beijing refuted the claim, Ho reported Snowden had been informed by a government representative that he was a free man and should act upon it. True to the word he’d given the
SCMP
, when Snowden was asked to leave, he did. Ho could not confirm whether the diplomat was from Hong Kong or Beijing but strongly suspected the latter.
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Chief Executive and President of the Executive Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Leung Chunying interjected, stating Hong Kong’s hand had not been forced, and Beijing only offered its advice. An anonymous source familiar with Snowden’s case said, “One hundred percent there was communication between Hong Kong and the central government regarding how to handle Snowden.”
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Regardless of whether Beijing issued an explicit or implicit “suggestion,” it was clear mainland China did not want to contend with the political implications of harboring Snowden.

Washington’s gravest mistake was dragging its feet in revoking Snowden’s passport atop bowing to public pressure in revealing the charges before the purported fugitive was in custody. It allowed the world to know exactly what Snowden was up against and enabled him to prepare accordingly.

China sought neutrality when it came to Snowden. By neither detaining him nor protecting him, it had essentially ignored him. China’s official communist newspaper,
People’s Daily
, made sure to highlight this fact: “China is generous enough not to hype this incident in consideration of the Sino-US relationship.”
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It had likewise refused to neither help nor hinder the U.S. government just as the U.S. had for China the year before. Heralded police official Wang Lijun was thought to be seeking political asylum when he entered the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu on February 6, 2012. Washington neither recognized an appeal if one was made nor did it arrest the Chinese fugitive. It merely asked him to leave. China had now returned the indifferent favor.
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Representative King was perhaps unaware of this piece of historical trivia when he stated, “For some reason Hong Kong and China wanted to let Snowden get away and this is a direct slap at the U.S.”
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A Shanghai official speaking on a condition of anonymity rightly observed that Snowden served no purpose to China: “It is also impractical for China to hope Snowden will cooperate with us. If he wanted to do that, he’d have flown to Beijing.”
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Not only did mainland China acknowledge the implied and later overt message by Snowden in his decision to land in Hong Kong instead of China’s capital, it realized he meant what he said on June 17. He was only willing to work with the press, not governments. From a political perspective, apathy had been met with apathy.

On Sunday, June 23, to the U.S. government’s dismay, it discovers Snowden has flown to Russia.

Midday Sunday, after 34 days in the Pearl of the Orient, Ho and Man accompanied Snowden to Chek Lap Kok Airport.
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He boarded Aeroflot SU213 with WikiLeaks’ Sara Harrison, a close advisor to Julian Assange.
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At 5 p.m. local time, they landed 4,500 miles away at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo International Airport.
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WikiLeaks footed the tab for the flight as well as a portion of his lodgings while in Hong Kong and later Russia.
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Though the American government thought it was on the verge of cornering Snowden and forcing China to hand him over, Washington satisfied itself believing it had him on the run.

What the Capitol didn’t know was that it was about to be cast in the role of the fool in one of the most beautifully orchestrated multinational political ploys in modern history. Weeks before, Snowden had received a quiet offer to make the former Soviet Union his home. In order to avoid straining already-taut relations between America and Russia, all he had to do was wait until it appeared he had no other choice but flee Hong Kong. To make his coincidental arrival in Russia appear convincing, an expertly choreographed plot involving international intrigue and denial was devised. The script was ambitious. The fact that it succeeded is nothing short of breathtaking.