Reykjavík Grapevine - 21.06.2013, Blaðsíða 14

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ICELANDIC PRODUCE
MEDITERRANEAN TRADITIONS.
Iceland | FAQ
by Sam Knight
A Future Citizen Of Iceland?
Examining the Snowden case
Just three years after WikiLeaks first published classified information with help from volunteers in Reykjavík, another massive national security scandal in
the U.S. has managed to weave Iceland into its narrative. After leaking top-secret documents to the Guardian detailing clandestine American intelligence
activities and cyber warfare, a 29-year-old former intelligence contractor named Edward Snowden wants refuge in Iceland.
While it could put Iceland on a collision
course with the world's sole superpow-
er—American officials have launched a
criminal investigation into Snowden, who
is currently hiding out in Hong Kong—two
prominent opposition MPs told the Grape-
vine that Iceland should welcome the
whistleblower. Calling Iceland a country
“that puts a strong emphasis on personal
freedom and the internet,” former minis-
ter of foreign affairs and current Social
Democrat MP Össur Skarphéðinsson said
that “Iceland could very well justify grant-
ing him asylum on political grounds.” And
former minister of the interior and current
Left-Green MP Ögmundur Jónasson said
that Snowden “is doing us all a favour by
telling us about espionage allegedly con-
ducted by U.S. authorities.”
“This is no private matter for the
Americans since it has to do with gath-
ering information about individuals and
groups on the internet,” Ögmundur added.
“We Icelanders should follow this very
carefully and be open to the idea of giv-
ing Edward Snowden asylum here if he so
wishes, even offer him assistance.”
Snowden first brought up the issue of
a permanent sanctuary in Iceland when he
outed himself in a June 9 interview with
Guardian journalist Ewan MacAskill who,
alongside colleague Glenn Greenwald, had
used the former contractor's leaks as the
primary source for explosive reporting.
“My predisposition is to seek asylum
in a country with shared values,” Snowden
said. “The nation that most encompasses
this is Iceland. They stood up for people
over internet freedom.”
Although he didn't explicitly mention
it, Snowden was referring to Iceland's
post collapse experimentation with 21st
century transparency. Icelanders wel-
comed WikiLeaks in late 2009 after the
Kaupþing-RÚV gag order scandal—a
move that set the stage for Reykjavík to
play a massive role in Cablegate and the
subsequent fallout. Alþingi’s unanimous
approval of the Icelandic Modern Media
Initiative (IMMI) in 2010—a resolution
calling on Iceland to modernize protection
for journalists and freedom of information
laws—similarly garnered international at-
tention.
A fanciful desire?
But Snowden himself mentioned that his
desire might be fanciful. Even the Interna-
tional Modern Media Institute—the non-
profit organization that essentially started
out as a lobby for IMMI, the parliamentary
resolution—noted that other nations could
offer Snowden stronger protection due to
“the security implications of asylum.”
In a statement issued after Snowden
went public, IMMI Executive Director
Smári McCarthy and Birgitta Jónsdóttir,
IMMI chairman and Pirate Party MP—
both former WikiLeaks volunteers who
have been contacted by American offi-
cials for their work—noted that “Iceland
may not be the best location, depending
on various questions regarding the legal
framework.” Iceland and the United States
have an extradition treaty, and Iceland, ac-
cording to reports based on WikiLeaks
disclosures, was party to the CIA's ex-
traordinary rendition programme under
the Bush administration between 2001 and
2007—an era dominated by the incumbent
ruling parties.
Snowden himself remarked, in a June
17 Q&A with Guardian journalists and
readers, that he believed staying in Hong
Kong, for the time being, offered him more
security than a direct trip to Iceland.
“I had to travel with no advance book-
ing to a country with the cultural and legal
framework to allow me to work without be-
ing immediately detained,” he explained.
“Hong Kong provided that. Iceland could
be pushed harder, quicker, before the pub-
lic could have a chance to make their feel-
ings known, and I would not put that past
the current U.S. administration.”
Ready to assist
Despite potential pitfalls, IMMI noted
in its June 9 statement that it planned to
reach out to Snowden and Minister of
the Interior Hanna Birna Kristjánsdóttir.
And in an email, Smári said that IMMI
has, in fact, reached out to Snowden
through their contacts who are in touch
with him. “The message was simply that
we stood ready to assist,” he said.
Investigative journalist and
WikiLeaks spokesperson Kristinn Hraf-
nsson said in a Fréttablaðið column that
a representative for Snowden approached
him on June 12, requesting his help li-
aising with the Icelandic government.
Smári added that IMMI has also contact-
ed the Icelandic government “explaining
the steps that we have taken and that we
would attempt to be involved.”
Jóhannes Tómasson, a spokesperson
from the Ministry of the Interior, said
that Kristinn Hrafnsson requested a
meeting on his case and this request was
granted the same day. “A representative
of the Ministry of the Interior met him
and went over with him the legislative
arrangements regarding asylum seekers
and the rules that are in force,” he said.
“The legislation is general and applies
equally to everyone,” he said. “In order
to apply for asylum in Iceland, the in-
dividual in question must be present in
Iceland and make the application in his
or her own name.”
Whether or not the Snowden case
would impact Iceland's foreign relations,
the domestic climate might not be terri-
bly favourable. In May, when Ögmundur
Jónasson was still minister of the inte-
rior, Iceland deported 29 ethnic Serbs
to Croatia on the grounds that ethnic
minorities are protected under Croatian
law, even though reality might not com-
port with the law.
Is it possible?
Iceland has also not yet become the sort
of digital age safe haven that Snowden de-
scribed.
“Whistleblower protection is woefully
unlegislated,” Smári said. “Most of the
progress to date has been in the form of
research and development of laws, not in
the actual proposal and adoption of laws.”
The majority of journalistic protections
that have been codified into law as a re-
sult of the 2010 parliamentary resolution,
he wrote, somewhat concern “information
and telecommunications acts” and “a new
media law, which protects sources and
places transparency requirements on me-
dia outlets.”
But, he noted, if Iceland bestows citi-
zenship upon Snowden, it would be illegal,
under article 66 of the Icelandic constitu-
tion, to extradite him.
“Whether the same applies to those
who have been granted asylum is a slightly
complicated question,” he said. “Generally
speaking, those granted asylum are not au-
tomatically citizens, nor do they have the
rights of citizens.”
Nor would Snowden have to be in
Iceland to become a citizen by act of Par-
liament. Össur pointed out that Alþingi
granted citizenship to Bobby Fischer last
decade. The chess legend, who had be-
come increasingly infamous for anti-Se-
mitic rants—not a crime under U.S. law—
and allegedly evading taxes and breaking
the travel embargo against Yugoslavia in
1992—both crimes under U.S. law—was
granted Icelandic citizenship in 2005,
while under detention in Japan.
“I acknowledge that it might be politi-
cally difficult for the government to be a
prime mover of such a proposal,” Össur
said. “However, if my memory serves me,
some of the new ministers in our govern-
ment were among the sponsors of a whis-
tleblowers' bill, among them our beloved
minister of foreign affairs. So instead of
confronting the government with the issue,
it might be an idea to solicit their tacit ap-
proval for a Private Members Bill on yield-
ing political asylum to Snowden.”
A bigger issue
At the heart of the matter lies not just an
academic conversation about individuals'
privacy. In the U.S., for example, federal
officials played a role in cracking down
on the Occupy Movement. Anti-war activ-
ists and anarchists have been investigated
for political beliefs in counter-terrorist
probes. Journalists—from WikiLeaks
founder Julian Assange to Fox News'
James Rosen—have been investigated
by the Obama administration's Justice
Department for allegedly conspiring to
leak classified information—something
that “senior administration officials” and
friendly journalists do all the time in D.C.
Iceland, too, has not been left un-
molested by the long arm of American
spookdom. In 2011, for example, the FBI
turned up unannounced to interview a
WikiLeaks associate. Ögmundur, howev-
er, ordered the Icelandic police to refrain
from cooperating.
The involvement of NSA intelligence
gathering is unclear in these cases. But
considering how the Obama administra-
tion stands accused of trampling on free
speech and privacy, dubiously, in the name
of national security, the global import of
the former contractor's allegations is un-
questionable. Icelandic law, too, might
have been subverted, with Snowden pro-
viding mounting evidence of global data
mining, espionage, and cyber warfare.
“Edward Snowden is doing us all a
favour by telling us about espionage al-
legedly conducted by U.S. authorities,”
Ögmundur said.
“The Icelandic government, being
charged with safeguarding Icelandic sov-
ereignty, should take a stand on this issue,”
Smári added. “I have no doubt they will.”
Stills from video
‘Edward
Snowden is
doing us all a
favour by telling
us about espio-
nage allegedly
conducted by
US authorities,’
Ögmundur said.
“
„
14The Reykjavík Grapevine Issue 8 — 2013