Snowden criticizes Russia's deteriorating human rights record

A giant screen displays the image of fugitive US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden as he is represented by an empty chair while being awarded the freedom of expression prize Bjornson in Molde, Norway, on September, 5, 2015. PHOTO: AFP

AFP writes in the Tribune,

Former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden — who has been granted asylum by Russia — criticised the country’s crackdown on human rights and online freedom Saturday as “wrong… disappointing and frustrating”.

Snowden called Moscow’s restrictions on the web “a mistake in policy” and “fundamentally wrong” as he accepted a Norwegian freedom of expression prize by videophone from Russia.

“It’s wrong in Russia, and it would be wrong anywhere,” said Snowden, 32, who was granted asylum by the Kremlin two years ago after Washington filed a warrant for his arrest for having leaked documents that revealed the vast scale of US surveillance programmes.

Pushed on Moscow’s deteriorating human rights record, the whistleblower said the situation is “disappointing, it’s frustrating” and described restrictions on the Internet as part of a wider problem in Russia.

“I’ve been quite critical of (it) in the past and I’ll continue to be in the future, because this drive that we see in the Russian government to control more and more the internet, to control more and more what people are seeing, even parts of personal lives, deciding what is the appropriate or inappropriate way for people to express their love for one another…(is) fundamentally wrong,” he said.

Snowden said he had “never intended to go to Russia”, and that he had been transiting the country en route for Latin America when US officials cancelled his passport.

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