Hong Kong lawmakers urge Obama to 'tread very carefully' with Snowden case
Legco to debate Snowden case and hacking disclosures next week
Two pan-democratic lawmakers urged US President Barack Obama on Friday to stop all legal action against and “consider letting go” NSA whistle-blower Edward Snowden who has taken refuge in Hong Kong.
They made the comments at a press conference at which they also made public a letter they have sent to Obama urging him to not allow "national security" claims to justify abuse of state power.
In the 400-word letter, Claudia Mo Man-ching of the Civic Party and Gary Fan Kwok-wai of the NeoDemocrats, democratically elected members of the Legislative Council urged Obama to “tread very carefully and take into account the views of America’s democratic friends around the world.”
“President Obama probably wouldn’t want any stain ... on his political career,” said Mo.
I’m asking the United States not to even try to charge [Snowden]
Mo and Fan – members of the group Hong Kong First – stated in the letter that Snowden’s actions may be seen as similar to those of whistle-blower Daniel Ellsberg, a national security analyst, who in 1971 passed to The New York Times defence documents known as the Pentagon Papers that enabled the American public to better understand the challenges the US was facing in Vietnam War.