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| Edward Snowden in Moscow Airports, sitting next to Sarah Harrison of Wikileaks |
Courtesy of
Joshua Foust:
July 18, 2012: Wikileaks is reported to be nearing bankruptcy due to a freeze-out by banks.
December 2012: Freedom of the Press Foundation, which has Glenn Greenwald and documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras on their board of directors, announces their launch with the explicit purpose of funneling money to Wikileaks.
December 2012: According to Glenn Greenwald, Edward Snowden first emailed him, anonymously. In an interview with Harpers, Greenwald says he initially ignored the emails.
January, 2013: Edward Snowden contacted documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras, according to an interview in Salon. Poitras notes her familiarity with encryption methods thanks to her close contact with Wikileaks for a previous film, and her involvement with TOR developer and hacker Jacob Appelbaum (who was investigated for his ties to Wikileaks in 2011).
February-May 2013: Snowden exchanges emails with Greenwald and Poitras, according to the Washington Post, but does not reveal his identity.
March, 2013: Snowden takes “infrastructure analyst” job at Booz Allen Hamilton for the explicit purpose of stealing documents from the NSA, according to an interview he gave the South China Morning Post.
April, 2013: Jacob Appelbaum goes on vacation in Hawaii, according to a June 25 talk he gave in Berlin (approximately 25:30 into the video). He does not report having any contact with Snowden.
May 1, 2013: A real estate agent in Hawaii says Snowden and his girlfriend moved out of their house, but did not know where they went afterward.
May, 2013: Poitras and Appelbaum conduct an interview via encrypted email with Snowden, asking detailed technical questions to ensure Snowden possessed the skills and knowledge he claimed. Appelbaum says in an interview in Der Spiegel that he did not know Snowden’s identity. Appelbaum does not release any further details about the content of the technical discussion.
Early May, 2013: Snowden “indirectly” contacts Barton Gellman (the meaning of “indirectly” is unclear), who begins working on the PRISM story at the Washington Post.
May 16, 2013: Snowden directly communicates with Gellman for the first time (the meanings of “direct” and “indirect” are unclear).
May 20, 2013: Snowden flees Hawaii for Hong Kong, winding up in the Mira Hotel.
May 24, 2013: Snowden tells Gellman of his desire to apply for asylum in Iceland, then asks Gellman to “publish — within 72 hours — the full text of a PowerPoint presentation describing PRISM.” When Gellman balks, Snowden apparently contacts Greenwald.
June 6, 2013: The Guardian publishes the first in its ongoing cache of documents provided by Snowden.
June 9, 2013: The Guardian reveals Edward Snowden as the source of the leaks and publishes the first of two video interviews with him. Snowden says of his leaking: “I have no intention of hiding who I am because I know I have done nothing wrong.”
June 10, 2013: Wikileaks founder Julian Assange praises Snowden as a hero from the Ecuadorian embassy in London.
June 10, 2013: Snowden checks out of the Mira Hotel in Hong Kong, whereabouts unknown.
June 19, 2013: Assange says Wikileaks is giving Snowden legal counsel and helping him “broker” asylum.
June 22, 2013: A New York Times story included “a person familiar with the case” saying Snowden was staying at an apartment under Hong Kong police protection. It is removed within 24 hours.
June 23, 2013: Snowden leaves for Moscow. The Wall Street Journal reports that Wikileaks advised Snowden to leave Hong Kong; fearing a loss of internet access, he does. A source tells the WSJ no Chinese officials were involved in his departure; a New York Times report disagrees. Izvestia, a state-owned Russian newspaper, writes that the Kremlin and its intelligence services collaborated with Wikileaks to help Snowden escape from Hong Kong (Wikileaks did not mention any official involvement in Snowden’s departure from Hong Kong in their press statements).
June 28, 2013: The AP reports that the transit hotel where Snowden is staying costs $300 per night.
July 4, 2013: Israel Shamir, a Wikileaks spokesman (Wikileaks denies this, but former Wikileaks employees insist he worked closely with Julian Assange. Shamir had earlier helped Belarussian dictator Alexandr Lukashenka oppress dissidents with Wikileaks data, and was placed in charge of editing Russian-language cables), praises Snowden to Zavtra, an anti-Semitic Russian-nationalist magazine edited by Alexander Prokhanov (whose own background of communism and anti-Semitism is worth noting). Shamir favorably compares Snowden to renowned British defector Kim Philby.
July 9, 2013: Bernd Fix, a fundraiser for Wikileaks, says the group has gone from raising €2,000 a month in 2012 to €1,000 a day, still below the group’s high of €20,000 a month in 2010.
There's more, a lot more, and all of it backed up with links, but you get the idea.
So the question, besides Snowden's motives, is WHO has been helping Snowden, and what are THEIR motives?
It also should be noted that Russia has not officially given Snowden asylum, and that Eric Holder
issued a letter to Russia saying that if returned Snowden would not be executed, nor face torture.
Which may mean that he is in no way out of the woods yet. In fact the Russian woods may be much worse for him in the long run than anything he might face in the United States.
