Nicaragua And Venezuela Offer Edward Snowden Political Asylum

Edward Snowden received a flurry of asylum rejections in the past week as European nations stumbled over themselves to make excuses to protect their interests with the USA despite overwhelming public support for offering Snowden asylum in Europe. Furthermore, as of three days ago Snowden had over 10 rejections from 21 applications. However, Snowden has finally received some offers courtesy of two Latin American nations according to Russia Today.

First up is Nicaragua and just yesterday evening Nicaragua’s president Daniel Ortega stated that:

“We are open, respectful of the right to asylum, and it is clear that if circumstances permit it, we would receive Snowden with pleasure and give him asylum here in Nicaragua”

Furthermore, Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro also pledged to offer Edward Snowden asylum in the spirit of Venezuela’s tradition of fighting “imperial North American prosecution”. Rather fittingly Nicolas Maduro made such a televised speech on Venezuela’s independence day.

“I have decided to offer humanitarian asylum to the young American, Edward Snowden, so that in the fatherland of (Simon) Bolivar and (Hugo) Chavez, he can come and live away from the imperial North American persecution”

With two asylum offers from Nicaragua and Venezuela Edward Snowden now has two safe havens to flee from American persecution until things settle down in the USA. We expect that more nations will now follow the same path and offer Edward Snowden asylum. The battle is still not over though as Snowden needs to be able to get from Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport to either Venezuela or Nicaragua without crossing airspace of nations that may choose to ground his flight and then extradite him to the USA where he could face an extensive jail term or possibly even the death penalty.

Image courtesy of the Guardian