Stuck in the Sheremetyevo Airport with his passport revoked, US whistleblower Edward Snowden has applied for temporary asylum in Russia, fearing torture if he is turned over to the US government.
Snowden already has asylum offers from Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia, but the US has made it virtually impossible for him to travel and EU nations have shown a willingness to force down airplanes on suspicion he might be on them.
According to Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena, Snowden has agreed to Vladimir Putin’s precondition that he stop leaking information related to US surveillance schemes during his asylum stay there.
Putin insisted he has no opinion on the application, and that the decision to grant asylum would be entirely up to the Russian Federation’s Migration Service. Putin has previously expressed a preference for Snowden to leave, and complained that the US is simultaneously mad at him for Snowden being in Moscow, but making it impossible for Snowden to leave.
Spill all the dirty secrets. You're already a dead man walking, at least as far as the US Gov't. is concerned. The Democratic President who promised a more transparent gov't. has prosecuted more whistleblowers than all other Presidents put together since the Espionage Act was introduced in 1917. He also apparently seems to get a personal jolly out of it…
Take the bastards down with you!