Russia Grants Snowden Temporary Asylum, Faces US Fury

Local Editor

Russia on Friday faced fury from the United States after granting asylum to fugitive intelligence leaker Edward Snowden, whose whereabouts are now a mystery after he was finally able to walk free from an airport transit zone where he was marooned for over five weeks.

The White House said it was "extremely disappointed" by Moscow's decision, adding that it would now review if a US-Russia summit in September is necessary.
Snowden, 30, is wanted on felony charges by the United States after leaking sensational details of vast US surveillance programs.

But he slipped out of Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport unnoticed by journalists on Friday and took a taxi to an undisclosed location, after winning temporary asylum from Russia for a year.

The US citizen has been issued a 12-month residence permit, which can be extended indefinitely. Snowden only has to register and then has the legal right to travel anywhere in Russia.

The WikiLeaks anti-secrecy website said in a statement that the former National Security Agency [NSA] contractor is now in a "secure, confidential place".
Snowden thanked Russia and slammed the administration of US President Barack Obama for having "no respect" for international or domestic law.
"But in the end the law is winning," he said in the WikiLeaks statement.
The White House warned Russia's decision could prompt Obama to cancel a planned visit to Moscow for talks with President Vladimir Putin ahead of the Saint Petersburg G20 summit.
"We're extremely disappointed," White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters. "We're evaluating the utility of a summit in light of this."
President Vladimir Putin has yet to comment on Snowden's temporary asylum. He is due to meet youth supporters at a summer camp later Friday.
Russian commentators saw Snowden's asylum as Moscow's move to assert its independence.

"Any other decision would have been a loss of face for Russia. If we hadn't provided Snowden with asylum, people would stop seeing Russia as a force to be reckoned with," a lawmaker for ruling United Russia party Vyacheslav Nikonov, told Kommersant daily.
In an editorial in Izvestia daily, nationalist radical politician Eduard Limonov wrote that "Russia acted like an independent, serious power. Now I'm sure our weight in the world will increase."

Earlier, US Senator John McCain expressed his outrage with Snowden's Russian asylum and demanded Washington re-examine its relations with Moscow and "strip away the illusions that many Americans have had about Russia."

"Russia's action today is a disgrace and a deliberate effort to embarrass the United States," he said. "It is a slap in the face of all Americans. Now is the time to fundamentally rethink our relationship with Putin's Russia. We need to deal with the Russia that is, not the Russia we might wish for."

McCain's proposed countermeasures include, expansion of the Magnitsky Act, completion of all phases of the US missile defense programs in Eastern Europe and support for Russian "dissidents" like Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Alexei Navalny.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team