Snowden exit: Hong Kong revels in its rule of law

by Staff Writers

Hong Kong (AFP) June 23, 2013

Hong Kong failure to arrest Snowden 'troubling': USWashington (AFP) June 23, 2013 - The United States is disappointed by Hong Kong's "troubling" failure to arrest fugitive intelligence leaker Edward Snowden before he fled the territory, an official said Sunday. A Department of Justice spokesperson insisted US officials had fulfilled all the requirements of Washington's extradition treaty with the autonomous Chinese region and were "disappointed" by the decision to let him go. Snowden, a 30-year-old former intelligence contractor, is wanted by the United States on espionage charges, after he quit his job with the National Security Agency and fled to Hong Kong with a cache of secret documents. On Sunday, Snowden left Hong Kong and fled for Moscow, despite Washington having requested his arrest and extradition. Hong Kong officials said the documentation supporting the extradition request had been incomplete. But the US Department of Justice denied there was anything missing. "The US is disappointed and disagrees with the determination by Hong Kong authorities not to honor the US request for the arrest of the fugitive," the spokesperson said in a statement. "The request for the fugitive's arrest for purposes of his extradition complied with all of the requirements of the US-Hong Kong Surrender Agreement," the statement said. "At no point, in all of our discussions through Friday, did the authorities in Hong Kong raise any issues regarding the sufficiency of the US's provisional arrest request," it said. "In light of this, we find their decision to be particularly troubling." The statement said senior US officials had been in touch with their Hong Kong counterparts since June 10, when they learned Snowden was in Hong Kong and leaking details of secret surveillance programs to the media. On Wednesday, US Attorney General Eric Holder spoke to Hong Kong Secretary for Justice Rimsky Yuen and urged Hong Kong to honor the request for Snowden's arrest. The Hong Kong government had said that, as it "has yet to have sufficient information to process the request for provisional warrant of arrest, there is no legal basis to restrict Mr Snowden from leaving Hong Kong."

Hong Kong has risked the threat of US reprisals in allowing Edward Snowden to leave. But its government insists that the rule of law took primacy for a territory that jealously guards its separateness from mainland China.
On social media, there was talk of political considerations at play in allowing the former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor to escape his Hong Kong bolthole.
As Snowden landed in Russia US Senator Dianne Feinstein, chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, declared that "the chase is on".
Russian media reports said he would fly to Cuba and eventually Venezuela, but Ecuadoran Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino later said he had requested asylum in Ecuador.
His departure left some supporters in Hong Kong disappointed.
Did the government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) want to remove an irritant that threatened to drag on for years, if Snowden fought through the courts against US attempts to extradite him? Did Beijing, with an eye on its overarching relationship with Washington, similarly want no truck with a lingering distraction?
In a press statement confirming the 30-year-old's shock departure, Hong Kong authorities said the reason was simple: the US government had failed to meet the legal bar needed to justify its arrest warrant issued on Friday.
The statement said that documents provided by the US "did not fully comply with the legal requirements under Hong Kong law", so the HKSAR government had asked for more information.
As Washington had not met its request, "there is no legal basis to restrict Mr Snowden from leaving Hong Kong", it added, saying that he had left the Chinese territory legally and voluntarily.
While Beijing retains ultimate control over its defence and foreign policy, and the right to veto extradition decisions, Hong Kong enjoys a high degree of autonomy under the handover agreement that governed its transfer from British rule in 1997.



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