Macron urged to defy Trump and grant Edward Snowden asylum

Snowden has lived in Moscow since 2013 when he was granted asylum following his leaking of state secrets he obtained and distributed from the NSA (National Security Agency). He revealed the extent of the US government’s global surveillance campaign that was undertaken with the cooperation of telecommunication companies and European governments. This included the tracking and harvesting of private emails, phone calls and mobile phone locations, as well as government programmes to bolster surveillance and hacking of citizens across the world.

Throughout his career in the CIA and NSA Snowden grew disenchanted due to concerns over the morality of the government’s surveillance programmes, and eventually revealed all to The Guardian’s Ewan McAskell in Hong Kong.

The US courts have now issued two 10-year sentences that Snowden would have to serve should he be forced back to his home country, as he was found guilty of theft of government secrets and spying.

Now, two senior advisors to Macron are urging the French President to step in and defy Donald Trump.

Snowden’s asylum in Moscow expires in 2020, but due to his regular criticism of the “corrupt” Russian government he will now be looking for a new home.

Macron’s justice minister Nicole Belloubet said she would be “for granting asylum”.

Leader of Macron’s party in the European Parliament Nathalie Loiseau said: “Edward Snowden is someone who has rendered service to humanity.

“He is someone who showed us, complete with proof, that there was an extraordinarily vast system of surveillance working with businesses which were giving out their users’ data behind their backs.”

Snowden had applied for asylum in France in 2013, but then President Francois Hollande turned him away.

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Macron has seemed keen to get Trump on side in recent meetings, but Trump has threatened the French leader with tariffs earlier this year after the government in Paris pursued a ‘tech tax’ on multinational corporations such as Google.

Trump threatened Macron with tariffs on wine in response.

source: express.co.uk