Reuters / Kacper Pempel

 United States officials believe that classified intelligence taken out of the country by NSA leaker Edward Snowden has been compromised by agencies in Russia and China.

Snowden, a 30-year-old former employee of intelligence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, fled the US for Hong Kong last month and then supplied journalists with classified information pertaining to vast surveillance operations conducted by the American government’s National Security Agency.

Both Russian and US officials have made claims that Snowden is now in Moscow, likely arranging for possible asylum in another country. In the meantime, though, US sources speaking with the Washington Free Beacon say that China and Russia have gained access to “highly classified US intelligence and military information contained on electronic media” held by Snowden.

“The exact compromise of the secret data held on Snowden’s laptop computers remains unknown but is the subject of an ongoing damage assessment within NSA and other intelligence agencies,” Bill Gertz of the Free Beacon wrote on Wednesday.

According to Gertz, those officials fear that Snowden may have accessed recently created nuclear war plans that could pose as future embarrassment for the US in the wake of disclosures already attributed to Snowden.

Previously, Snowden supplied The Guardian newspaper with documentation showing how the NSA routinely collects the phone records pertaining to millions of Americans every day. On Thursday this week, The Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald and Spencer Ackerman published their latest installment in the NSA leaks, exposing further surveillance under the administration of President Barack Obama that put Internet records directly into the hands of government officials.

Snowden has said that he’s personally reviewed the trove of documents supplied to The Guardian and other outlets, carefully evaluated every single one “to ensure that each was legitimately in the public interest.” Glenn Greenwald said that Snowden brought “thousands” of files with him to Hong Kong, “dozens” of which he believes are newsworthy.

What exactly Snowden knows remains a mystery, however, and he reportedly has four laptops in his possession right now that contain classified intelligence.

Earlier this month, the Washington Post cited an anonymous former intelligence official who claimed that Russian authorities were almost certain to seize any computer files Snowden brought into the country.

In a separate article earlier this month, the Post quoted another former senior US intelligence official who predicted that any intelligence compromised by Russia would have seen a similar fate en route from Hong Kong.

“I guarantee the Chinese intelligence service got their hands on that right away. If they imaged the hard drives and then returned them to him, well, then the Russians have that stuff now,” the source said.

“The Chinese already have everything Snowden had,” a separate source added to the Beacon’s Gertz this week.

Obama’s Africa visit: US playing catch-up with China

 US President Barack Obama began his African tour in a bid to strengthen ties and investment opportunities. But experts say the task might prove difficult as China already has significant influence in the region and US is forced to play catch-up.

Obama arrived in Senegal on Wednesday and is also set to visit South Africa and Tanzania.

The president’s tour is happening as US is taking on a bigger military role in Africa, RT’s Gayane Chichakyan reported.

“We hear about new drone bases popping up on the African continent in countries whose governments receive aid from the US in one form or another. We hear US arming and training US security forces in a number of states in Africa, then we learn how some of those forces commit horrible atrocities and yet the US does not stop to take a second to look who they empower,” Chichakyan said.

Just a few recent examples of US-backed violence include, a UN report about US trained troops in Congo guilty of mass rape and other atrocities and a Human Rights Watch report documenting abuse, rape and torture of at least 1,000 Somali refugees by US-backed Kenyan police forces.

One of the reasons why US wants to strengthen ties with Africa is to push out China’s growing influence from the region, an expert told RT.

“They want to of course maintain relations with all these different African states and at the same time to edge out the People’s Republic of China that has been gaining considerable amount of influence in Africa. Just over the last few years China has become the number one trading partner of the African Union,” editor of Pan-African News Wire Abayomi Azikiwe said.

Another reason for increased US involvement is the fact that Africa is an extremely rich continent and US wants to keep its oil imports secure.

This is Obama’s second trip to sub-Saharan Africa since he first assumed office in 2009, but it might fall short as China has already been making great strides in Africa.

The time Obama has spent in Africa falls short of significant when compared to China’s engagement in the region. China’s top leaders, including the president, vice president, premier, deputy premier, cabinet ministers and top Communist Party officials have visited around 30 African countries in comparison to Obama’s soon-to-be four.

China's current President Xi Jinping has visited three African countries since taking office on March 14, 2013 and former Chinese president Hu Jintao has been to 17 African nations in a single 10-month stretch between July 2006 and February 2007.

Watch Chichakyan’s full report for more information.

Edward Snowden, a former contractor at the National Security Agency (NSA), is seen during a news broadcast on television at a restaurant in Hong Kong June 26, 2013. (Reuters)

Hong Kong’s Justice Secretary said the US confused Snowden’s middle name, lacked his passport number in a request for his arrest and failed to provide evidence for charges, preventing HK officials from detaining the leaker before he left the territory.

The Hong Kong government did not assist Edward Snowden, the man who revealed the top-secret NSA surveillance program PRISM, in leaving the territory, but incomplete paperwork prevented officials from issuing a provisional arrest warrant, Hong Kong Justice secretary Rimsky Yuen Kwok-keung said on Tuesday, according to the South China Morning Post.

The US referred to the former CIA employee and NSA contractor’s middle name as ‘James’, however the Hong Kong Immigration Department had the name ‘Joseph’, Yuen said. The application also lacked Snowden’s passport number, so there was ‘no legal basis’ to prevent him from leaving Hong Kong.

“Therefore, it was impossible and there was no legal basis under Hong Kong law for the Department of Justice to ask a Hong Kong judge to sign off on a provisional arrest warrant,” Yuen said adding  “[Thus] there then was no legal basis to restrict or ban Mr Snowden from leaving Hong Kong.”

The US said Sunday it was “disappointed” by Hong Kong’s “troubling”  failure to detain the man responsible for the biggest leak of US intelligence in history, before he fled the territory on Saturday. The White House has insisted that the personal information in the paperwork of the leaker the US submitted to Hong Kong was correct.

The Hong Kong government on June 15 received the US request to detain Snowden, who also revealed US cyber spying on China. It named three charges including unauthorized disclosure of national defense information, unauthorized disclosure of intelligence and stealing state property.

In this file picture taken on June 13, 2013 protesters shout slogans in support of former US spy Edward Snowden as they march to the US consulate in Hong Kong. (AFP Photo)

 Yuen said that the US failed to clarify the first two charges and did not provide any evidence for the arrest, rejecting suggestions that Hong Kong had been deliberately stalling for time.

“We had not been deliberately delaying the process. All along, we have acted in full accordance with the law,” Yuen said.

According to the extradition treaty between the two countries, the HK officials had no authority to honor the USA’s extradition request due to lack of evidence under the first two charges.

The justice secretary noted that he had requested information from the US on Thursday and the US government has not responded to the request.

"Until the minute of Snowden's departure, the US government had not yet replied to our requests for clarification," he noted. "Any suggestion that we have been deliberately letting Mr Snowden go away or to do any other things to obstruct the normal operation is totally untrue."

Hong Kong had not yet received a reply from the US to this request, as of Tuesday, said the South China Morning Post.

Whistleblower Edward Snowden is reportedly in the transit zone of Sheremetyevo International Airport in Moscow. 

The Nicaraguan government has an enthusiastic new investor for a project that rivals the Panama Canal and has the potential to completely change transoceanic trade.

Wang Jing, the chairman and owner of Hong Kong-based HNKD, a privately held infrastructure group, said his company has concrete plans for the ambitious project, which, in theory will break ground in 2014 and should be open for business by 2020.

Earlier this month, Nicaragua’s government granted a 50-year concession to Wang’s company for rights to build the canal.

"We don't want it to become an international joke, and we don't want it to turn into an example of Chinese investment failures," Wang said at a news conference Tuesday in Beijing, AP reports.

The Chinese government would have no involvement in the project, as China and Nicaragua at present have no diplomatic relations.

Wang said consultants on the project are US-based McKinsey & Co. and China Railway Construction Corp., China’s largest state-owned construction company.

The Nicaraguan government estimates the project will cost $40 billion, but Wang is confident the return on the investment will be high and enough to ‘make every investor smile broadly’ he said at a news conference on Tuesday in Beijing, AP reports.

The proposed 286-kilometer (178-mile) canal route to be built through Nicaragua. (Reuters)

 The 286 kilometer (178 mile) canal will cut through both land and sea, high and low elevations, and Jing concedes there are ‘a lot of conditions to be met’. There are five different routes being considered, and some variants include a ‘dry-canal’ element, transportation of goods on land between the two waterways.

The Panama Canal, considered one of the 20th century’s greatest engineering feats, is only 77 km in length.

HKND additionally received approval to build a railroad, two ports, an airport and an oil pipeline.

The source of Wang’s wealth is unclear, other than he invested in telecommunications and mining industries. On his company’s website, it says he is the chairman of more than 20 enterprises in 35 countries over the world, including Xinwei Telecom Enterprise Group in China, which is also a mobile phone service provider in Nicaragua.

Some Nicaraguan lawmakers and residents have expressed concern over Wang’s business background, as well as the company, which is only newly formed.

Beating the competition

Businessmen and entrepreneurs have been after this lofty investment for over a century, and the canal would compete with Panama’s almost century-old shipping passage.

Wang’s HNKD group estimates there are 1,150 million tons of global seaborne trade each year.

“World trade has been so developed today that it needs a new canal,” Wang said. “The Panama Canal is not big enough for the trade conducted currently between East and West.”

The canal will offer another passageway to link the Atlantic and Pacific, providing another route to China and the East Coast of the US.

The idea of a canal in Nicaragua via Lake Nicaragua is a century old, and dates back to colonialism. Spain first suggested the idea, and later American businessman Cornelius Vanderbilt successfully operated a trade route between the two oceans, until civil war broke out.

The route reduced the trade route between New York and San Francisco by nearly 800 kilometers.

In 2010, Nicaragua signed a contract with two Korean developers, Dongmyeong Engineering & Architecture Consultants (DMEC) and Ox Investment to construct a deep-water port on the Atlantic coast to improve capacity.

In 2009, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev expressed Russian interest in the canal project, but never pursued it further.

Instead of devoting coverage to surveillance information revealed by Edward Snowden, the mainstream US media has slandered him. This reaction highlights the inadequacies of the American news cycle, geopolitical analyst Eric Draitser told RT.

RT: It appears Snowden is still in Russia, although he is believed to be in an international transit zone. What do you think he will do next?

Eric Draitser: I think that’s impossible to say at the moment. We hear reports about Ecuador, though we’ve seen with the case of Julian Assange that that’s no guarantee. We’re still waiting to see. But what I think is most interesting is the reaction here in the United States. Your reports have talked about what we’re seeing internationally, maybe in governments or people around the world - but in the United States, we see a concerted propaganda campaign designed to demonize and destroy the image, if not the total character, of Edward Snowden. We see this happening from the right wing and also the left wing.  This is now becoming a real story inside the United States – the way in which the controlled media is attacking Snowden and serving the interests of the surveillance state and the partisanship behind President Obama.

RT: The US government wants Moscow to go in and arrest Snowden even though he’s in an international transit zone - a limbo area which is not officially on Russian territory. Do you think this is going to sour relations between the US and Russia?

ED: I think this is going to precipitate a fight out in the open, but remember that relations have been soured long ago. Remember that the United States has been positioning missiles throughout Eastern Europe and Asia for years. Washington has also placed missiles inside Turkey and elsewhere for the purpose of menacing Russia. The United States has engaged in cyber-attacks launched at its enemies in China and Iran, and it’s likely the Russians are involved in that too. So the relationship has been under the assault of the ruling class in the United States for quite a while – and the reason is because President Putin represents opposition. He represents a counter-veiling force to US hegemony. I think that the Snowden case is really simply a microcosm of that. Moreover, we see that Putin and the government in Russia represent the interests of international law, humanitarian concerns, and basic human decency – just like with Syria. The notion of extraditing Snowden to the United States is essentially delivering him into the hands of torturers, into the hands of criminals.

RT: You just talked about these counter-veiling forces rising. One of these forces is China. A lot of reports suggest that China may have helped Snowden leave the country and assisted him along the way. Is Beijing sending Washington a big message here?

ED: Absolutely. And I think the revelations from Snowden about the hacking of computers in Hong Kong is only the tip of the iceberg. We know that the cyber-attacks that have been launched by the United States, Israel, and their partners are only what we know publicly. There’s much more happening behind the scenes and the Chinese are angry about that. They’re also angry at attempts to demonize them as if they are somehow the ones conducting an illegal operation. This is purely deflection away from the fact that the United States is the criminal violator of human rights, that the United States is the one engaged in illegal activity, and that the United States attempts to impose its will through so-called diplomacy on countries like China and Russia against their own interests and against the interests of international law. Ten years ago, this would have stood. Today, not so much.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

The release of data about US hack attacks on China has deprived the West of the moral high ground in the cyber-war, Hong Kong City University Professor Joseph Cheng told RT. This could give China diplomatic ammo in future negotiations with the US.

RT: Nations have been spying on each other for as long as we can remember. Do you think there is any surprise here on China’s part?

Joseph Cheng: I don’t think it is a surprise for the Chinese authorities. Basically, China and all major powers in the world understand that internet capabilities and capabilities in outer space will be crucial in future warfare. It is very likely that the major powers would like to test their own capabilities, as well as those of their opponents and competitors. So China is probably a bit relieved at this stage that the Western governments and the Western public opinion no longer enjoy the moral high ground to criticize China.

RT: There's the opinion that goodwill between the US and many nations worldwide may have been degraded. But there is the argument to be made that China needs the US as much as it is vice-versa. What do you think?

JC: I agree with that. The recent summit between [President] Xi Jinping and President Barack Obama was a very important symbol, demonstrating that both leaders want to reduce mutual distrust and that they certainly would not like to see a deterioration in bilateral relations. In the handling of this incident it was obvious that the Chinese authorities did not want to further publicly embarrass the Obama administration. The Chinese authorities chose to allow Mr. Snowden to leave. And of course domestically the commentaries were very critical, but they were not the official position of the Chinese government. The Chinese government also did not make any attempt to exploit the presence of Mr. Snowden to extract information from him. So I think that the Chinese authorities would like to demonstrate that they value good relations with the US.

RT: Do you think China will play this to its advantage in the future armed with sympathy and confirmation that it is being spied upon by the US? How do you think China will use this going into the future?

JC: China will probably let it die down. But when Western governments pick up the issue again, China will feel it has a strong case for criticizing the double standards of Western governments. Ideally, it can be hoped that various governments throughout world will come together eventually to establish a set of norms governing surveillance of the internet. But this is of course a very idealistic view.

The new credit agency, the Universal Credit Rating Group, has been set up a rival the existing agencies Moody's, S&P and Fitch. It will based in Hong Kong, and provide a check on the big three, whom some analysts say have contributed to the 2008 crisis.

Dagon, RusRating and America's Egan-Jones Ratings will have equal shares in the venture, with an initial investment of $9 million.

The newcomer to the market is intended to provide some balance to the so-called Big Three which have strongly dominated the industry. Though rating agencies are a part and parcel of the global financial system, they were little known before the crisis. After the global turmoil broke out in 2008 Moody's, S&P and Fitch were strongly criticized for over-estimating complex mortgage-backed investments and thus persuading investment in “bad assets” by those who initially didn’t want to take up the risk. It became one of the key triggers to the current economic crisis.

Ratings by the three global agencies have been used as guidelines for investors in their decision making, as they indicate to buyers of debt the probability of the debt being paid back. Universal is to operate under a "dual-rating" system, which means other local agencies would also be involved and issue their own ratings. This will enable investors to "see there is a difference of view and then the investors can make their own mind up," CNN quotes Universal CEO Richard Hainsworth, who is also president of RusRating.

Experts say the move is definitely in the right direction, but it’ll take Universal time to win credibility.

“Anything to introduce greater competition … will encourage everybody to have better discipline. But I think it will take time for this new rating agency to establish itself,” Avonechith Siackhachanh, senior advisor in the Asian Development Bank's Office of Regional Economic Integration, told CNN.

Just a day before the deal Moody’s downgraded the Hong Kong banking sector outlook to negative, referring to negative interest rates and the chances of a Hong Kong property bubble.

The US has gone from ‘model of human rights’ to manipulator of internet rights, the mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party wrote. China has struck back at the US over its allegations that Beijing allowed NSA leaker Edward Snowden to leave Hong Kong.

The damning article in the overseas edition of the People’s Daily, the party’s official newspaper, came in response to Washington’s accusations of the “deliberate choice by the government to release a fugitive despite a valid arrest warrant.”

Addressing Washington’s allegations, the People’s Daily wrote that China could not accept "this kind of dissatisfaction and opposition.”

"Not only did the US authorities not give us an explanation and apology, it instead expressed dissatisfaction at the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region for handling things in accordance with the law,” wrote Wang Xinjun, a researcher at the Academy of Military Science in the People's Daily commentary. 

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying also denounced the US accusations as "groundless and unacceptable.”

The Hong Kong government released an official statement on Sunday, saying that US fugitive Edward Snowden had left the Chinese territory for Moscow legally and voluntarily. The statement also mentioned that the extradition documents submitted by the US on charges of espionage were not sufficient to warrant Snowden’s arrest under Chinese law. 

 The column praises the former CIA contractor for “his fearlessness that tore off Washington's sanctimonious mask."Snowden has been branded by the US as ‘traitor’ by US politicians for the leaking of classified documents to The Guardian newspaper that revealed the existence of the spy program PRISM.  

"In a sense, the United States has gone from a model of human rights to an eavesdropper on personal privacy, the manipulator of the centralized power over the international internet, and the mad invader of other countries' networks," the People's Daily said. 

The case of Edward Snowden has captivated world media since he fled from the US in May. Although the fugitive’s whereabouts are unknown, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange confirmed to RT that Snowden was en route to Ecuador via Moscow accompanied by WikiLeaks legal representative Sarah Harrison.  

 Snowden was checked in for a flight from Moscow to Havana, Cuba, yesterday, but there was no sign of him on the plane, according to RT’s correspondent Egor Piskunov. As a consequence, it is now thought that he is still in the transit zone of Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport. 

The whistleblower has applied for asylum in Ecuador and the country’s government confirmed that it is processing the application.

Amnesty urges US: ‘Refrain from manhunt’

The US has called on all countries in the northern hemisphere to surrender Snowden to US jurisdiction and has resolved to seek cooperation from his destination country. However human rights organization Amnesty International has launched an appeal, urging the US not to prosecute anyone who discloses data on US government human right violations.

"No one should be charged under any law for disclosing information of human rights violations by the US government. Such disclosures are protected under the rights to information and freedom of expression," said Widney Brown, Senior Director of International Law and Policy at Amnesty International.

In addition, the organization also stressed that an individual who has an asylum bid underway cannot legally be extradited.

When it comes to the whereabouts of Edward Snowden, there has been far more conjecture than concrete fact. While Washington would do anything to get its hands on the whistleblower, tracking down Snowden has turned into a full on cloak and dagger affair.

On Sunday Edward Snowden left Chinese territory two days after espionage charges were leveled against him, setting off an international game of cat and mouse which has the United States’ massive global intelligence apparatus trying to cut the former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor off at the pass.

The White House for its part seemed to be certain that Snowden did in fact reach Moscow after taking off from Hong Kong on Sunday.“We have known where he is and believe we know where he is now,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said during a Monday afternoon briefing. “It is our assumption that he is in Russia.”

“I’m not going to get into specifics, but it is our understanding that he is still in Russia,” Carney continued. "We have asked the Russians to look at all the options and expel Snowden to the US,” he said.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has said on Monday that Snowden was in a “safe place.” Assange, who was unable to give further information as to Snowden’s whereabouts, claimed that Snowden had left Hong Kong on June 23 “bound for Ecuador via a safe pass through Russia and other states."

Shortly after Snowden allegedly arrived in Moscow, the government of Ecuador announced it had received an asylum request from the fugitive whistleblower. Assange claimed Snowden, whose passport was reportedly revoked one day prior to his departure from Hong Kong, was further granted a refugee document of passage.

It has been reported that Snowden was snaking his way around the globe to avoid capture, with a complicated route which would have seen him fly from Moscow to Caracas via Havana, with the expectation that he would later travel on to the Ecuadorian capital Quito.

While the state-controlled Russian airline Aeroflot said that he had checked in for flight SU150 to Havana with two seats (17A and 17C) in his name on Monday, seemingly half the world’s press corps was on board, but Snowden was conspicuously absent.  

The fact that hefailed to board a Moscow-to-Havana flight on Monday following his hasty escape from Hong Kong one day prior begs the question: did the world’s most infamous whistleblower step foot on Russian soil at all? 

 Wikileaks and unnamed sources

The government of Hong Kong never specified Snowden’s destination, only stating that he had in fact left Chinese territory for “a third country” on Sunday. The Russian government has made no official comment regarding the whistleblower either.

Although reporters noted the heavy presence of Russian security services at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport, Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov disavowed any knowledge of Snowden’s arrival in the Russian capital.

“I don’t [know if he's planning to stay in Moscow]. I heard about his potential arrival from the press. I know nothing,” Peskov told the Guardian on Sunday.

When RT contacted Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) regarding the matter, the agency declined to comment.

With no corroborating video footage, the only actual proof that Snowden arrived in Moscow on Sunday evening stem from three primary sources: WikiLeaks, the government of Ecuador and anonymous sources working within the airport.

Wikileaks, whose representative Sarah Harrison reportedly accompanied Snowden on the flight, regularly sent out tweets up until flight SU213 touched down in the Russian capital around 5:00 p.m. local time. 

The anti-secrecy group said in a statement that the former CIA technician is on his way to Ecuador "via a safe route for the purposes of asylum, and is being escorted by diplomats and legal advisors from WikiLeaks."

A source from within WikiLeaks, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed to RT that the rogue NSA leaker was indeed on the flight, passing on the names of Ecuadorian officials who were slated to meet Snowden at the airport.

An unnamed Aeroflot official also told Russia’s ITAR-Tass news agency that the former CIA technician was indeed on board Flight SU213 which landed in Moscow.

Shortly after flight 213 landed, Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino tweeted that “The Government of Ecuador had received an asylum request from Edward J. #Snowden.” Cars baring license plates for the Ecuadorian diplomatic mission were spotted at Moscow International Airport Sheremetyevo. 

Ecuador's ambassador to Russia, Chavez Zavala, was also seen at the airport. Just moments before stepping into a hotel on the airport’s premises, he reportedly told journalists: "We're waiting for [Sarah] Harrison. We're going to talk to them."

Although Snowden had reportedly taken a suite at the «V-Express» Capsule Hotel in Terminal E of the airport’s transit area, no visual confirmation of the former contractor has surfaced despite the myriad passengers and swarm of journalists staking out quite possibly the world’s most wanted man.
A source at Aeroflot told Interfax news agency that Snowden had checked into the hotel, noting that “he cannot leave the terminal as he has no Russian visa." Harrison, he added, did have a Russian visa.

Another source told the agency of the unprecedented security measures which had been taken “to maintain Snowden's security and to guarantee his safe departure.” “Everything has been done to allow Snowden to spend the night peacefully at the airport's capsule hotel and to fly quietly to Cuba," the source continued.

However, on Monday evening a source at the hotel later told RT that Snowden had in fact never checked in or out of the facility.

It bears recalling that WikiLeaks, which did everything possible to draw attention to Snowden’s location between takeoff and landing, has a vested nterest in concealing the fugitive whistleblower's actual movements.

Ecuador has already shown its willingness to take big political risks by granting Assange diplomatic asylum at its London embassy, where the Wikileaks founder has remained holed up for over a year. With round the clock police surveillance and a diplomatic standoff with the UK government set to last for years, Quito might have decided on avoiding another diplomatic showdown by facilitating Snowden’s safe passage before he arrives in Ecuador.

Destination unknown

Once Snowden failed to show for his Havana-bound flight, RT’s Irina Galushko noted there were at least four flights leaving on Monday that could put Snowden on route to Ecuador. A source familiar with the situation earlier told Interfax that Snowden might take the next flight to Latin America via Cuba.

“He’s probably got another ticket also via Cuba, as there are no direct flights [from Moscow] to Caracas or Quito.”

Like so much other information that has leaked out of Moscow’s international hub, nothing ever materialized. The same source later told Interfax that Snowden was probably already outside of the Russian Federation.

Speaking at a joint press conferred with his Indian counterpart in New Delhi, Secretary of State John Kerry said he had no knowledge of Snowden’s final destination, adding he would be deeply troubled if Moscow or China had prior notice of Snowden’s travel plans, Reuters reports.   

More baffling to Washington is how Snowden ever left Hong Kong as his passport had been revoked one day prior. On the same day, the US asked Hong Kong to hand over Snowden under the terms of a 1998 extradition treaty with the Chinese territory.

However, The Hong Kong special administrative region [HKSAR] government said their decision not to block Snowden’s departure stemmed from the fact that “the documents provided by the US government did not fully comply with the legal requirements under Hong Kong law.” “As the HKSAR government 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. The HKSAR government has already informed the US government of Mr Snowden's departure,” the statement continued.

On Friday, federal prosecutors filed a criminal complaint against Snowden for leaking a trove of documents regarding the NSA’s clandestine surveillance programs.

Snowden was charged with theft, “unauthorized communication of national defense information” and “willful communication of classified communications intelligence information to an unauthorized person.” The last two charges were brought under the 1917 Espionage Act, which allow for the issuance of an international arrest warrant against him.Russia, which has no extradition treaty with the US, said it would be under no obligation to hand over a US citizen. Foreign Minister. Sergey Lavrov has previously said Russia would be willing to consider an asylum request from Snowden. However, an unnamed security official told RIA-Novosti news agency on Monday that no orders for Snowden's arrest have been dispatched through Interpol to Russian law enforcement agencies. Speaking from Hanoi on Monday, Patino said he did not know Snowden’s current whereabouts, or where the whistleblower planned to travel next.

The Ecuadorian FM, who read a letter in which Snowden likened himself to Bradley Manning, the US army private who is currently on trial for leaking classified information to Wikileaks, intimated that the former NSA contractor’s asylum request would be considered on human rights grounds.
Following news that Snowden’s passport had been revoked, State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki said he "should not be allowed to proceed in any further international travel, other than is necessary to return him to the United States."

That Snowden could leave Hong Kong on an invalidated passport despite the charges leveled against him speaks volumes about the fallout from the United States sweeping surveillance activities.
And despite the massive troves of information the US government continues to cull both at home and abroad through PRISM and related surveillance programs, one critical fact remains elusive: where in the world is Edward Snowden?

A lawyer for the former spy agency contractor has pointed out that Edward Snowden was told to flee Hong Kong by a middleman claiming to represent the Chinese controlled territory – which evidently could mean the advice was Beijing-backed.

Lawyer Albert Ho, who is also a Hong Kong legislator critical of China, indicated that he was approached by Snowden several days ago, according to Reuters.

The American asked the Hong Kong government if he could leave the city freely if he chose to do so, and tried to find out the Hong Kong government’s position on his situation.

After that, Ho met a senior Hong Kong official, who did not offer any comment.
However, Ho claims Snowden later told him an individual supposedly representing the Hong Kong authorities had contacted him and indicated he should leave the city, and wouldn't be stopped by the authorities.

Ho said he believed the middleman was acting on Beijing's orders. However, he had no solid evidence to prove it.

"They (Beijing) used someone behind the scenes to get Snowden to leave. And the Hong Kong government didn't have much of a role. Its role was to receive instructions to not stop him at the airport," Ho told Reuters.  

Ho stressed that in his opinion the case was clearly monitored and controlled by Beijing. 
"From seeing the nervousness with which the Hong Kong government didn't even give me any details at all <...>I have grounds to believe that the Hong Kong government had no authority over this case. That's to say the whole case was decided by Beijing."

Hong Kong is a former British colony which reverted to Chinese rule in 1997 and although it retains an independent legal system and its own extradition laws, China is believed to have control over Hong Kong's foreign affairs. The Hong Kong government didn’t immediately comment on Ho's claims.

The Chinese government has expressed “grave concern” about the revelations of the US government's cyber attacks on Beijing.

“This once again proves that China is a victim of cyber attacks," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in a statement.

On Sunday, the NSA leaker fled from Hong Kong to Russia, and was supposed to board a plane for Havana, Cuba.

However, he wasn’t seen during the boarding which took place at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport on Monday.

The White House expressed objections to authorities in Hong Kong and China that the countries let the whistleblower flee, and to Russia, urging Moscow to extradite Snowden to the US as soon as possible.

"We expect the Russian government to look at all options available to expel Mr. Snowden back to the US to face justice for the crimes with which he is charged."

Snowden has been charged by the US authorities with theft of federal government property, unauthorized communication of national defense information and wilful communication of classified communications intelligence to an unauthorized person. The last two charges fall under the US Espionage Act.

Nestle allegedly played a role in a chocolate fix pricing scandal, and is under investigation by the Competition Bureau of Canada for conspiring, agreeing, and arranging to fix prices of chocolate products in Canada from 2002. Mars Inc, Hershey Canada Inc., and ITWAL Limited are also under investigation.

The companies face a possible fine of up to $10 million and a possible jail time for executives. The former president of Nestle Canada, Robert Leonida was charged, along with Sanda Martinez, former president of confectionery for Nestle Canada, and David Glenn Stevens, president and CEO of ITWAL.

Nestle has over 330,000 employees worldwide in 83 different countries and 461 factories.

Russia is “a very safe place” for the NSA leaker Edward Snowden as it will not be pressured by the US, former MI5 agent Annie Machon told RT as the whistleblower arrived in Moscow reportedly en route to a third country.

Snowden – who is wanted in the US for revealing two highly-classified surveillance programs – left Hong Kong and landed in the Russian capital on Sunday afternoon. It is unclear, where the 29-year-old source behind the biggest leak in the NSA history will head next, but reports suggest he might go to Venezuela via Cuba.

Annie Machon says whatever country Snowden ends up in, it must be “strong enough to push back because there will be immense pressure from the US to hand him over.”

RT: Why do you think Snowden left Hong Kong? Didn't he feel protected enough there?

AM: I think he was very canny to flee there in the first place because Russia and China are probably the only two countries who can effectively stand up to the brute force of US diplomacy these days. Now it appears that the warrant for his arrest was sent to Hong Kong, there were problems with the paper work and that allowed Snowden to flee Hong Kong, while the Chinese reply to the problems.

It’s also interesting that in their press statement they said that they were complaining officially to the US for the US spying on them – which, of course, came from revelations leaked by Snowden. So, they are pushing back, they gave him the chance to flee. And again, I think it’s a very canny move to go to Russia because he can be safe there and then can plot to where else he wants to go.

An airport security guard walks past a sign at the departure hall of Hong Kong Airport June 23, 2013. Edward Snowden, a former contractor for the U.S. National Security Agency, charged by the United States with espionage, was allowed to leave Hong Kong on Sunday, his final destination as yet unknown, because a U.S. request to have him arrested did not comply with the law, the Hong Kong government said. (Reuters / Bobby Yip)

 RT:  Should Hong Kong have taken steps to prevent the wanted man from leaving its territory?

AM: I think they fulfilled the legal requirements. You know, there’s been so much in the western media for the last few years about the Chinese hacking our systems and everything. They must be very pleased to have evidence that the US in fact is doing the same to them, so they can push back. So, I think it was good place for Snowden to go.

The irony now is that it’s the US that the whistleblower has to flee from because at the moment the Obama administration is waging a war on whistleblowers: not just Snowden, but also people like Bradley Manning and a whole range of other whistleblowers from the CIA and the NSA. For example, John Kiriakou of the CIA - who exposed the US torture program - is the one currently languishing in prison for thirty months, not the torturers. So, I think the irony is the people have to fear the US when all they are trying to do is expose the crimes of the US. It must be bitter.

RT: The US had warned the Hong Kong authorities ahead of today's developments, so how do you think it will affect relations between the two?

AM: Well, Hong Kong was just going by the legal book. So, really the US does not have anything to complain about. There was a sort of slow warming of the diplomatic relationship between China and the US. And I think that has probably sent it backwards.

However, I would suggest that Snowden has done a public service not only to the US people but to the people of the world in exposing quite how badly we are being watched and surveyed by the US and some NATO states.

RT: We're getting reports that Snowden's been granted asylum, although it's still unknown which country's offered safe shelter. What's your guess?

AM: I know that it’s been a lot of speculation that WikiLeaks has been trying to help him in getting asylum in Iceland, but he needs to get there first. Iceland does have a very good reputation for protecting transparency and freedom of information on the internet. So that may well be a possibility.

But Snowden needs to ensure that he goes to a country which doesn’t have an extradition treaty [with the US] or does have an extradition treaty but it does not cover political offences. [A country] should also be strong enough to push back because there will be immense pressure from the US to hand him over.

RT: Is there a chance he could be intercepted by the US en route to a third state?

AM: Possibly, yes. So, in fact getting to Russia is a very safe place to be at the moment because they will not be pressured. The unfortunate choice though of Russia here is that it will make it very easy for the Western media to deem him to be a traitor now, which might mean he may face even more charges under the espionage act.

Strategically, if he was to remain in Russia and Russia was seen to protect him, and not try and use him it would send a very strong message to the whole world about who exactly is the totalitarian state these days – is it the US or is it other countries like Russia or China?  And I think that Edward Snowden’s choice of refuge demonstrates very much that the US is currently the bullyboy of the world.  

reportedly, #Snowden at passport control at VIP terminal in #moscow airport; all cameras discovered our stakeout #wikileaks #news #cia — Irina Galushko (@IrinaGalushkoRT) June 23, 2013

Interfax news agency is citing an unnamed source in Sheremetyevo airport management, saying that Snowden is still at the airport.

"Snowden is a transit passenger, his next flight is to Cuba, he remains in the airport complex – where he’s supposed to be, waiting for the next flight," the source said.

A source in the Aeroflot company told the agency that the whistleblower, who is accompanied by WikiLeaks representative, Sarah Harrison, has rented a suit at the airport’s «V-Express» Capsule Hotel.

“He arrived. But he can’t leave the terminal because he doesn’t have a Russian visa,” the source said.

Two cars with diplomatic numbers of Ecuador – the country named among Snowden’s possible destinations – were spotted at Sheremetyevo airport.

RT’s source reported a doctor from the Ecuadorian embassy in Moscow has examined Snowden on his arrival in the Russian capital.    

waiting for #Snowden -- a crowd of journos and confused passengers #wikileaks #cia pic.twitter.com/r8vM1RsKXM — Irina Galushko (@IrinaGalushkoRT) June 23, 2013

WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, told Australian Sydney Morning Herald paper that Snowden will be met by “diplomats from the country that will be his ultimate destination” in the airport, who’ll accompany him on a further flight to his destination. 

waiting for #Snowden -- a crowd of journos and confused passengers #wikileaks #cia pic.twitter.com/r8vM1RsKXM
— Irina Galushko (@IrinaGalushkoRT) June 23, 2013

Earlier, a spokesperson from the Hong Kong government confirmed that Edward Snowden had "legally and voluntarily" left the country.

“Mr. Edward Snowden left Hong Kong today (June 23) on his own accord for a third country through a lawful and normal channel,” said the Hong Kong government in a press release. The statement also said the documents for Snowden’s extradition submitted by Washington “did not fully comply with the legal requirements under Hong Kong law.”

“As the HKSAR Government has yet to have sufficient information to process the request for a provisional warrant of arrest, there is no legal basis to restrict Mr. Snowden from leaving Hong Kong.”

WikiLeaks legal aid

Whistleblowing organization WikiLeaks has rallied behind Snowden and said they are assisting him in his bid for political asylum in a “democratic country.” The group announced on Twitter that they helped obtain “travel documents” and ensured his safe exit from Hong Kong. Diplomats and legal advisors from WikiLeaks legal team is also accompanying the NSA leaker on his flight to Moscow, WikiLeaks said in a statement. 

FLASH: Mr. Snowden is currently over Russian airspace accompanied by WikiLeaks legal advisors. — WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) June 23, 2013

A source from Aeroflot told Interfax that Snowden is on flight SU213 to Moscow, landing on Sunday afternoon.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov said the Kremlin was unaware of Snowden’s plans to fly to Moscow. The US has filed an extradition order against Snowden for espionage, theft and conversion of government property.

It is understood that Moscow will not be Snowden’s final destination, he could potentially fly on to Ecuador or Iceland where he has allegedly applied for asylum. A diplomatic source told the Russian news agency Itar-Tass that no request for asylum in Russia had been received from the former CIA employee.

Citing a source close to Snowden, Russian news agency Interfax reported that the whistleblower’s final destination will be Venezuela with a transfer in Havana, Cuba.  He will reportedly be on flight SU150 to Havana, leaving Moscow on Monday and then on flight V-04101 to Caracas.

“He chose such a complicated route in the hope that he would not be arrested on the way to his final destination of Venezuela,” the source told Interfax.

The US will seek cooperation with governments of countries where Snowden may go, Justice Department Spokeswoman Nanda Chitre stated on Sunday.

“We will continue to discuss this matter with Hong Kong and pursue relevant law enforcement cooperation with other countries where Mr. Snowden may be attempting to travel,” she said, as cited by Reuters.

'More whistleblowers will follow'

 The emergence of whistleblowers like Julian Assange, Bradley Manning and now Edward Snowden means the world will have an  increasingly clearer view of the actual state of affairs, Pepe Escobar, an Asia Times correspondent in Hong Kong told  RT.

“Definitely, we’re going to have a collection of Assanges, Mannings and Snowdens from now on, especially from the US tech geeks who are extremely uncomfortable with this Orwellian panopticon surveillance thing: not only in the US as we’ve seen some revelations on Britain as well. It is an Anglo-American thing. Of course everybody is involved in cyber wars, but the forefront is the US,” Escobar argues.

Don Debar, an anti-war activist and journalist, believes that Snowden’s actions will encourage more whistleblowers to come out.

“You have Bradley Manning and they throw him on ice, basically naked in a cell for a couple of years and threaten him with the death penalty. After him you have Assange and now you have Snowden and I only hope more will come out and people will start to listen here in the United States and do something about it.”

Whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange and Bradley Manning, the world is likely to hear more about the actual state of things says Pepe Escobar, Asia Times correspondent in Hong Kong talking with RT.