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The next talk is the untold
story of Edward Snowden's escape
from Hong Kong and how
you can help the refugee refugees
who saved his life.
And we have three speakers today
at this talk. Lena Loba is
for Amnesty International, Germany's
expert on human rights and the digital
age, and a moral philosopher
by training.
Then we have Zonker
Ivarson.
He's head of the Investigative Research
Unit at Hundreds Blood.
His specialty, uncovering corruption,
fraud and gross mismanagement.
And finally, Robert Thibeault,
he is a human rights lawyer in Hong
Kong and incidentally, one
of Edward Snowden's lawyers
and is still in contact with him today.
And this is your stage.
And please give a warm round of applause
to all three of those.
Thank you. Hi, everyone.
Can you hear me?
Very good.
As I've just been told, my name is Lena
and I work for Amnesty International
in Germany, where I cover human
rights in the digital age.
We're still figuring out what exactly
that means, but it includes
issues of freedom of speech and
information online and the
human right to privacy, which
is being undermined
by mass and targeted surveillance
and lots of other human rights rights
which are threatened or strengthened
by the increasing use of AICTE.
Usually it's both at the same time.
At Amnesty, we are also part of the
campaign to pardon Snowden,
which I'm going to tell you about today.
Tonight, your first going to hear about
Snowden and his current situation in
Russia and then about his escape
from Hong Kong and
how to help the refugees who saved him.
And I'm really happy to see many people
here interested in this talk because I
think there's a fascinating story to be
told later.
Unfortunately, not my part of the talk,
but this and I believe it is
an important story to tell, especially
in these times with the ongoing
debate on refugees and asylum
for refugees are often portrayed
as an anonymous mass,
more the object of political decisions
than actors of change, which
themselves, of course, they also are.
But before we come to that, let's start
with the Snowden situation first.
As you all know, Snowden shared U.S.
intelligence documents with journalists
and summer 2016
in Hong Kong, which revealed the shocking
extent of global mass surveillance.
Snowden claimed that the sole motive
for this was, and I quote his own
words, to inform the public
as to that which is done in their name
and that which is done against them.
But the US government branded him
a traitor who, as they say,
has significantly harmed U.S.
national security interests.
So, yes, this current situation
after fleeing Hong Kong, you are stuck in
transit at the Moscow airport
until he was granted a temporary
right to remain in Russia.
Yes, the authorities, U.S.
authorities have revoked his passport,
which interferes with his ability to
travel to other countries and to apply
for asylum in a country of his choosing.
There have been several offers, among
them Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua.
He has been granted residency in Russia
until August 2017.
After that could be extended or not.
There's no way to get.
So why doesn't he just return to the
U.S., at least President Obama
seems to think that this is what he
should do.
Sorry.
This is.
OK, so we don't have electricity.
I'm very sorry about that.
Can someone help me with that?
I was going to show you a video,
and I believe that for environmental
reasons, you shouldn't give up on your
old computers too early.
So I'm still using my eight year old
MacBook and its batteries broken because,
as you all know, they have a problem with
the batteries.
So.
This is.
It's a short intermission.
Just as nice, isn't it?
Oh, yeah, very good.
Thanks for giving me such a great cue.
Why stop now?
That's what I said, I'm
glad
so the computer is repeating,
no, I'm sorry, the computer is rebooting.
As I said, it's a pretty old one.
There's something you can do while I'm
waiting for it to reboot besides singing,
which is great. And I get
there are pants and papers
next to the microphones, one to six.
And you can just hand them out if a
sitting next to it, just share them with
others around you.
So everyone has a pen and paper.
It's just on paper.
I see the spreading is commencing.
That is nice, who I hope
you are all are familiar with the
six to one rule.
Yes, yes.
Some now
no.
Six hours of sleep, two meals and one
shower.
Not every day.
Every day.
Of all three days.
Who will follow that?
Hands in the air, please.
And everybody who did not follow that
knows why he's not or she
is not raising their hands.
Right.
Some people joked about this all six
hours a day.
That is quite a lot.
One meal and only two hours of sleep.
I'm exhausted.
Already told
there's lights flashing and
I hope now this is going
well.
We'll take a few moments.
OK, you're doing a great job.
Oh, thank you. Doing a really great job
and.
And singing, that
is actually quite nice when
when such things happen.
I like your
so this is a picture I took in South
Africa at a memorial
for apartheid and the fight against
apartheid.
I thought it was a pretty warm
South Africa. Definitely.
That was my first thought.
Also,
sorry, I don't want to make
fun of you.
That's that's that's really your day.
Sorry, guys.
No, there's no stress.
I think we have no we will
keep keep a tight schedule.
I know when I make loose comments
about this is the last talk and then
there's a big break, I will be
slaughtered afterwards or at least beaten
into a dark corner or something
or drowned in chunk or something.
Which would not be that
bad, actually,
not drowning,
but.
Well, the.
I could show resistance at the first.
Well, don't go there, I think, right
now.
So, uh, another
thing is I think we
have not only those three
around here so far,
I can give you a hint, was
also maybe attending
the thing.
Some of you maybe have recognized
that there's a little bit more going
on at this corner where we have set up
all the technical stuff
and that there's some new
equipment arrived from another room.
But that is enough evidence, I
think, for the most of
you.
I am hypnotized by this pieces of
what is actually rock
another joke.
Well, so when somebody
is able to articulate, then
you have much way too much
processing power in your brain left.
So let's do Tisza.
So everybody silently in your head
think of a number between one and
ten, not
telling that the other the other guy
silently and then multiply
it by nine please.
And when you have the results, add
up the single digits,
so the when you have twenty
three at two plus
three is five like
that, OK, then you divide five.
You've got that.
OK, when you're not not
divide five, subtract five, I'm sorry,
subtract five, not divide by five,
subtract, subtract five.
I'm sorry.
And now you count through
the alphabet.
When you have one, you take A
to B three, C,
four, five E and so
on and so forth.
And now this letter you
have with your result in
your head silently search for a country,
starting with that letter
which has a border with Germany
and a fruit.
Denmark and Dutch, Denmark
and dates are Dutch and dragonfruit.
No.
Maybe I give away the secret about this,
I think Obama wants to talk.
Yes, he doesn't want to talk.
He just wants to look a little grumpy.
And I think that's because he knows that
what he's going to say is not going
to resonate well with you for good
reasons.
I'm sorry.
Mean.
We had this copy wrong's to point
out just about two
hours ago and this and it's all maybe you
want to give a summarize of
what is saying.
Yeah, probably always assumed
to speak up or on
the parking lot that I have more videos
on here, so I'm terribly
sorry about that. If I had a worst case
scenario, how this would go, it would be
my computer without electricity for a few
seconds. And I guess we should just
change and I'll do my part later.
And you do your parts first.
I'm so sorry about that.
OK.
OK, that looks so
nice,
and so you don't
think there's
no doubt
that we're going to
I
don't know.
From one of
its boosters, again, it's
unclear.
Yeah.
Hello.
Well,
you know, I
think we can
break this down, I will.
OK.
Good evening.
Thank you for coming.
My name is Zonkey Ibbetson and I'm an
investigative journalist at Handelsblatt,
which is for those who are not
from here. I'm from here.
I was born in Hamburg, spend
most of my life here.
And then I went
out into the world.
Now my metabolism, which is like the
German Financial Times, Wall
Street Journal.
And since 2012,
we we found it at Handelsblatt, an
investigative research unit,
which is like the Spotlight team.
Of Germany, of my paper, at least,
and so we we cover
mismanagement, fraud, corruption,
sometimes when we do well, people
go to jail.
And about a year ago, I
came across this story
of Edward Snowden
that nobody had
heard before.
And I was surprised because
I thought Edward Snowden, everything's
told the whole
world media has covered it,
but actually there was a big part
missing.
And I would like to
tell you today about that part.
And about the people who saved
Edward Snowden's life and for
who have for three years remained
completely silent on that,
many people have taken credit
and the Snowden story.
I will not name any names now,
but those who actually saved his life
when he came out and
told the world about the mass
surveillance.
They have remained silent and
they're in big trouble.
So.
Most of you, I assume, have seen
this movie sit in for
it's a very good movie.
And again, you would assume that
the documentary about Snowden, how
Snowden came, who he was
and told the world about
us, would also tell
everything there is to know about him.
But again, there's a scene
missing. There's something very big
missing, actually, two weeks missing.
If you remember, there's a scene
right after the
morning after he he gave his
interview with The Guardian.
You see him in his hotel room, room
10, 14.
And he's kind of walking
around, there's a scene, he's looking in
the mirror thinking of how can I reshape
my face? So my dye, my hair
cut, my hair put on sunglasses.
He's holding a mirror at one point,
an umbrella,
and then the phone rings.
And he's talking to somebody.
And he's saying, OK, all right.
Are you sure?
Because I can grab my stuff
and I can just get out and you don't
hear the other side of the conversation,
but actually the man on the other side
of that telephone is here today.
We will very soon hear from him.
And then you see them hanging up the
phone.
And he's just standing there
and you see him saying,
and I thought to myself, why
is he just standing there?
This man is now thought after
the police is chasing him.
The NSA is chasing him, the CIA.
Everybody's chasing my colleagues,
hundreds of journalists at that time,
flooding into the city to Kowloon
in Hong Kong to search for Edward
Snowden.
And he's just standing there,
not moving.
And then the next thing you see is
the door opens.
He's getting out of the hotel.
And the next scene and Citizen four is
actually two weeks later, so
it doesn't for does not show where Edward
Snowden hid in
Hong Kong for two weeks before
he boarded that Aeroflot
plane to Moscow, where he still
is today.
So how did he do that?
And I would like to welcome now
to the stage the man who hit Edward
Snowden for two weeks when
the whole world was
chasing him.
Yeah, so so
obviously, the most
the easiest question for me is
where were you on that Monday morning,
June 10, 2013, when Edward
Snowden became the most wanted man alive?
That was that was on June the 10th.
And for a period of time,
as everyone knows, there was
an unknown employee
of the U.S. government who
was leaking information
about the U.S. government's spying
is about six a.m.
and my phone rang and
I was tired Monday morning
and I
answered the phone. On the other side of
the phone was a request for help.
And
it was explained to me is Mr. Snowden
and that he
had a video of
him in an interview with The Guardian.
Glenn Greenwald had been televised.
So at that point, I jumped out of bed,
shower, put my suit on,
grabbed my briefcase
and got in my car
and drove
to the ferry pier.
I live on an outer island,
and that was the fastest way to get to
Hong Kong Island on a high speed ferry.
So you can see Lantau Island and there's
a high speed ferry that goes across to
Hong Kong Island.
So time was of the essence
of.
As a lawyer, the approach I took
was there was a man who
was in immediate distress and I
also understood that he was the most
wanted man on the planet at that point.
So it was crucial that I had access to
him as soon as possible.
So my job is very easy.
How do you hide the most wanted
man alive? Where do you hide it?
What was going through your mind at that
time?
The first thing I needed to do was
gain access to to Ed
and in Hong Kong,
I had a solicitor with me.
So the first thing we had to do
is, is because what he had done,
in my view, was an act of political
opinion expression.
So we had to get him to the UNHCR office
in Hong Kong immediately so he could
raise his asylum claim.
And this was the first line of defense
if Mr. Snowden was arrested at any time.
It was his refugee claim that would
protect him from being removed
from Hong Kong.
We did that.
We walked him into the UNHCR.
So in the film Citizen for
you see my colleague, Jonathan
Mann, a solicitor,
and I'm on the phone with Mr. Snowden,
basically. And I told him,
don't worry, Jonathan Mann knows
where to take you.
And we're going to the UNHCR.
So once we do, Mr. Snowden raised
his claim at the UNHCR
for refugee status determination,
then the next step was we
had to
bring Mr. Snowden underground, put him
underground and take him off the radar.
And we were concerned that the media
would find Mr. Snowden.
And if the media found Mr. Snowden,
then the Hong Kong authorities would find
Mr. Snowden.
There's the US consulate in Hong Kong.
They would know where he was.
So one of our biggest fears was the US
government or a third government
would grab Mr. Snowden and unlawfully
rendition him.
Mr. Snowden would disappear.
The approach I took was Mr. Snowden was
an asylum seeker at that point, a
refugee.
And I have many, many clients who are
refugees, so it just
made sense to place him within
the refugee community, he was part
of that community.
The second reason is Hong
Kong asylum seekers are so marginalized.
They're considered.
It's Hong Kong's version of Untouchables
that is the most reviled
social group in Hong Kong, so
the place Mr. Snowden, a man of
his intelligence status,
his experience with the US government and
to place him in with the
refugee community in Hong Kong, mainly
people from South Asia, Southeast Asia.
This would be the last place the
world would look.
So immediately after the UNHCR.
I took we took Mr. Snowden to
stay with one of three refugee families.
The second crucial reason.
Aspect of this is we wanted
I wanted Mr. Snowden to be placed
in the middle of the city, no
one would expect Mr. Snowden to be hidden
in plain sight.
And the third reason was.
We wanted Mr. Snowden to have access to
wireless communications where he could
crack into any modem within
the area.
So we placed him
with a group of asylum seekers, three
families, and
through that process, Mr. Snowden was
sheltered and he was taken care of.
So now we will introduce
the people in Hong Kong, the refugees
who had Snowden, and we have pictures
of them.
Who is this? Now, this this
is one of my clients.
This is Mr. Agit.
Push the camera.
And he's a former soldier
in the Sri Lankan army.
He's ethnic Sinhalese.
It's about and for my life and
not his life. This is 20 years ago.
And Ajith is an extraordinary
individual.
He was tortured.
Um, there was an attempt to
extrajudicially kill him.
And in the end, he fled Sri Lanka.
And I chose
to help. Mr. Snowden
has an extraordinary ability
to move around
undetected and to move people around.
He has an extraordinary skill set.
And.
You don't know when he's there.
You don't know when he's not there.
Just an extraordinary man.
So he was the one individual that I
trusted to help us
move Mr. Snowden around.
Yeah. So now you know that while the NSA
and everybody else in the world was
looking for him, this was the man who
protected him.
Now, the sad part of
this story is AIG
has been an asylum seeker for 12 years
now.
He he fled after being
tortured in Sri Lanka, tortured by
the military.
He fled and
his asylum is still in progress,
so to speak.
And I think we have another picture.
And this is where Ajith lives at
this time, it's about
50 square feet, there's no windows.
And one
thing I'd like to
stress is that in Hong Kong.
Asylum seekers are not allowed to work.
The government does not meet their basic
needs,
and if they're caught working, they face
two years prison.
So Mr Ajith Spin in Hong
Kong and the Hong Kong government has
left him destitute
and.
The way they've treated this man, as with
the other two families, amounts to
a violation of Article seven of the
International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights, treating him
in an inhumane and degrading manner.
Nevertheless, Ajith has survived
in Hong Kong
and the one the other aspect.
Another reason why
I reached out to my asylum seeker
clients is the asylum seekers
all fled their home countries
running for their lives.
And when they met Mr. Snowden,
they saw Mr. Snowden as one of their own.
When they fled, they had to rely
and trust and put their hands
in other people's lives who helped them
escape their home countries,
the asylum seekers have the highest
propensity to protect others.
And that was the foundation upon
which I knew I could trust my clients.
And when asked, they step forward and
they said, yes, we recognize him.
We want to help him.
Yeah, it's it's an amazing
experience.
I met a six
month ago, and when I asked
him, why did you help Edward Snowden?
I mean, you had enough problems
on your own. And this was a man who was
sought after by the most powerful
nation and military intelligence
service on Earth.
And the only thing he said was,
of course, I helped him.
He was a refugee.
I was a refugee.
Of course I helped him.
And
this is the next.
Set of hosts for Mr. Snowden,
you know, yeah, this
is the second family, the gentleman
here is supporting
Kalapana and
that's his partner Medika.
Supporting is Sri Lankan Sinhalese.
And he fled Sri Lanka based on
political persecution and
his partner, ADCA, she fled
Sri Lanka based on gender persecution
and very typical in a country like Sri
Lanka.
Gender persecution
involves, unfortunately, rape
and human trafficking
and at times servitude and slavery.
So these two extraordinary, extraordinary
individuals fled to Hong Kong, supporting
more than 10 years ago the Dekha
more than seven years ago.
And both of their children were born in
Hong Kong.
And one thing I would stress is
the two children are stateless.
They have no nationality.
And the Hong Kong government by law
refuses to give them
any status in Hong Kong.
This is
the place where they live
and
right now the Hong Kong government.
Has not provided the support for
the young girl, Sepideh,
and she's not receiving an education in
Hong Kong.
But I'll I'll move on to another
subject later on what we've
been doing as lawyers to help these
families, to make sure they're
not destitute at this time,
as we have another picture when when
this is where they live.
You see, so they live in literally
one of the poorest areas of Hong Kong and
they live in a flat that's about 150
square feet.
The other thing I would like to mention
is that the screening system for asylum
seekers in Hong Kong
is so grossly unfair
that the acceptance rate since
nineteen ninety two in Hong Kong for
asylum seekers is point
three six percent.
So effectively, all asylum seekers
who seek refuge in Hong Kong
are rejected.
And the three families I'm representing,
they're looking at their cases being
rejected simply because the system
is just so grossly unfair.
And so that's them.
And this is the fourth
refugee who sheltered Edward Snowden
and incidentally baked him a birthday
cake for his 30th
birthday. And her daughter,
which you will see in a moment, sang a
happy birthday song to Edward Snowden.
This is Vanessa.
She's from the Philippines.
She was a victim of gender persecution
and she fled to Hong Kong
and.
She's the fourth adult or
the third family that provided shelter
to Mr. Snowden,
and that's a order.
This is her daughter,
Kiana.
And the
one thing I would mention is that
since their identities
were revealed to the public,
the Hong Kong government has targeted
Vanessa and her child
and has asked her questions
about Mr. Snowden and when she
refused to answer
those questions.
The government cut off all assistance to
her, so she gets no
assistance for food or rent.
Or education for her daughter,
they cut her off completely simply
because she refused to answer questions
about Mr. Snowden.
Yes,
that's you and her, it's
me.
So in essence, I
visited these families and
in summer and
shortly before the movie
Oliver Stone came out,
we we published the full
story and in my paper at
Handelsblatt and.
Well, good and things, good and bad
things happen.
There was a lot of there was an
outpouring of of
helpfulness. I got a lot of calls
and emails from around the world of
people who wanted to donate to these
these families.
And you see
the movie.
And of course, I wasn't set up for that
because the journalists don't usually
get calls for donations.
So we set up a.
We have that that that is
also in summer.
And this was this was
in July this year.
I traveled to see Mr. Snowden in Moscow
and shortly before the the film
Snowden came out.
But it was at that time
I had discussed with Mr. Snowden
the situation of the three
families because they were portrayed in
the Snowden film and
the decision was taken and the clients
were advised to to protect
them.
It would be better to.
Introduce them to the public before the
film came out so that
the public would have a very clear idea
and clear understanding of who they are,
what they did for Mr. Snowden,
basically to make sure
the public understood and understood them
as human beings.
Yeah, and Mr. Snowden was in full support
of that. And Mr. Snowden
is very concerned for my clients.
And he's he's also assisted them
financially.
But what we've done is we've
set up a Go Fund Me
crowdfunding campaign.
Here you have the site.
That's that's
the website to collect
even it's known that the thing
is, why did we print this article?
Well, first it was a story.
And for three years, these people have
remained quiet
because that's what
they all agreed on, Snowden and the
refugees.
And then the movie comes
out. And if you see the Snowden
movie of Oliver Stone,
it's an exciting movie.
You put the people who actually saved his
life have about 60
seconds of screen time.
If you see the movie, it's just
just a brown mess of helpful
people and then they are gone again.
So I thought it would it would
be really good to tell the full story.
And Snowden himself actually
was surprised when you told him.
He had no idea that these people who
saved his life were still in the same
place where they were they were three
years ago.
He was asking why
are they still refugees?
And actually, that's that's a good
question, that the
answer is the Hong Kong government will
not let them leave.
They would not let them stay.
They will not let them work.
They're just staying
in this miserable
presence.
And so this website
Go Fund Me was set up
because so many people wanted to help.
And here you can see somewhere on this
site, this is like on
this website, seven or eight hundred
people have donated
and.
Well, that's a good thing
that happened. The bad thing was that the
Hong Kong government actually cut when
they found out about these donations,
they cut off the service, the
the money to the families
that they received.
And so this is actually almost
the only thing they have donations.
And well, now
there's new hope. There's a second
website. And it's like
this is this is a fundraiser page.
Maybe you want to talk about the lawyers
who who are trying to get these people
to a better place.
Well, with the Go Find Me page,
we've been able to take those financial
resources and distribute
them to the three families in Hong Kong
so that their basic needs are met.
And this has provided them with a lot of
emotional security and certainty
in their lives at this time.
Three lawyers.
I'm from Montreal, Quebec originally,
and I've been working with three lawyers
that I know.
And the three lawyers in Montreal have
set up a fundraiser campaign
and they're also making efforts
to communicate with
the Canadian government.
To advocate,
advocate for Canada, to take in
the three families, these are seven
people.
And it's not a big stretch for the
Canadian government to take them in
the Canadian Go Fund Me
fundraiser site
has recently raised
more money.
And again, this is the second channel,
which is Canadian based and Canadian
focused, where we're trying to raise
more funds for the families so we can
sustain them in Hong Kong.
But we do have a view
that the Canadian government
should should take steps to bring
them into Canada, not to set a precedent,
but on the basis that these seven
extraordinary people protected a
whistleblower.
Some of the difficulties we're facing
are that a lot of people don't want to
donate for fear
that the US government
would see that they've made donations to
these three families.
These three families are innocent.
They've done nothing wrong
when they help Mr. Snowden.
They did it in good faith and they never
broke any laws.
One thing I want to stress is when Mr.
Snowden was in Hong Kong, at no
time was he a fugitive
under Hong Kong law.
The US government never sent through
a legally effective request for his
arrest and extradition.
So these people need they need support.
They need moral support.
They need public support, and they need
some financial support for help.
And I would ask everybody
here and I would ask that everyone
here ask communicate
to whoever you know.
To have the public become aware of who
these people are and no matter how
small the donation, every
euro, every dollar counts.
Yes, thank you.
Yeah, so so if everybody in here
not donate immediately, but
but I know you all have your phones
in your pockets, if you would, Twitter
and Facebook and all that,
that would be really nice.
And we're going to try now to
connect to Skype
with one of the refugees.
She's still at home, awake now.
It's
as well past midnight.
But we're going to try
to to Skype her.
And so you also may
ask some questions.
Hopefully, this will work.
It'll be my client, Vanessa, from the
Philippine.
So, well,
that's yeah.
Here we go.
No.
That's not her.
We don't know who that is.
We try again.
Yes, while we are awaiting
this all took a little longer than
expected and due to my computer problems,
we just had a little discussion.
I could either do my part
of the talk and I would have told you
about Snowden's current situation, how to
help him about legal cruelties
like the Espionage Act, World War
One he's being charged under and so
on.
I hope it would have been interesting,
but I thought that with so little
time remaining, it would be more
important to give the people who helped
him and who are refugees in Hong Kong
otherwise then Amnesty International
and me. So I'm going to skip that part so
you can have a Q and A with her.
And thank you anyway.
Sorry about that.
They tried to get it,
but I think we can have a question in
between, maybe if there's a I don't know
how that works. Is there somebody going
around with a microphone or
we should be on it.
OK, so we
try again with the
calling.
The technical difficulties never end.
This should have a name is
Dan Murphy or something.
OK, so I think we
can start with a Q&A
for our three speakers.
So please, when you have a question,
start to line up at the microphones
with, uh, here throughout the room,
four on the left side and three,
four on the right side on the balcony.
We have also one and I start with
the single signal
angel.
Not single and sorry.
OK, just hold it.
Maybe we have a connection.
Please signal Angel, give me the
question, OK?
Thank you. We had some discussion
in Irisa about your
fund raising platform because
the prizing, they
they keep quite a big share of 20
percent. Why is choosing this platform?
Yeah, could you
answer the question
at the end of the question was
yes, a
fundraiser or go find me?
There's there's really, really not much
option for us.
The the one thing I have to stress is
the only the only groups taking
any money from donations are the
fund raising, I guess the
platform or PayPal
and the banks.
But as for those who are actually
administering this, and the three
lawyers have formed an NGO in Montreal
and myself in Hong Kong, one
hundred percent of the money we receive
is distributed to the clients.
We don't take one penny for legal fees.
We don't take one penny for
administrative fees.
And actually, ourselves, we pay for
the banking fees.
So sorry.
Well, that's that's what we've done.
I mean, I think what you can see here
that that not everyone involved in human
rights work is as tech savvy as everyone
here. So if you want to talk to us later
about that, I guess all that
will be very welcome.
As a previous chemical engineer,
I'm a little bit tech savvy.
That's OK. And the second thing is the
three laws in Montreal have set up a
Bitcoin account so you can donate
to a fundraiser, go on to
the site and there's information on how
to donate through Bitcoin.
So my apologies for not raising that.
What what we did is Mr. Snowden tweeted
the fundraiser account on
Christmas Eve, and it was at that time
people were commenting, saying, hey, can
we do buy Bitcoin?
So we did that immediately.
So I hope that answers the question.
Yeah.
So I think we switch over to
work on new guest now
on the stage.
You can look directly at her
at the camera. We have her camera set up.
When you look at that direction, you look
at her actually.
So
naturally. Can you hear me?
Yes. Hi. Good evening.
So when I saw you see you have a lot
of fans in Hamburg.
I think
maybe if you would just describe, say,
your first five minutes when you
met Edward Snowden.
How was that?
I think everybody would like to hear
that from, you know,
when the first time I met Mr.
Snowden, I don't know
who's Mr. Snowden.
I'm very he's very
upset and
know
the time he needed to have the
stay home.
And my lawyer said table
and just I mean, knock
on my door.
So I didn't think twice
so that they let him in
my house.
And I'm very happy.
And I have
Edward Snowden
and I'm very thankful to
my lawyer, Mr. Robert Duvall.
And because he have
60 clients, Asylum-seeker,
and he trusted me to let
Mr. Snowden stay in my house.
And I'm very
also thankful for Snowden
because he
he appreciated
what I did
for him.
Thank you.
OK.
Yeah, yes.
Now, your turn.
Who would like to ask a question to
Snowden's guardian angel in Hong Kong?
We have a great opportunity
to take questions from the audience
or from the signal angels.
So when you have any questions, please
step up to the microphone
or do we have something from the signal
Angel?
Hello.
Signal Angel didn't want to
ask a question.
Maybe then when there is
not yet a question or not the courage
to ask, one may.
But I would like to ask you
a question.
How is your situation
now when you when you look
back on meeting Edward
Snowden and what
you experience and how do you
feel now? How is your situation changed
maybe by that to get involved
with this
thing that hit you
out of nowhere?
Oh, situation.
OK, my situation
right now is I have a difficulty
in the Hong Kong government
and I want my
assistance in Hong Kong, ICE's Hong
Kong and
I necessarily stop my assistance.
So I don't have any assistance right now.
I only have from
donations.
And in my case, In
Touch Weekly, the Hong Kong government,
they opened my case,
decided last month
and now
is activated.
And I know they want to check
my case and I am very
worried.
They want me to send them to pay the
bills. And this is not really
good for me. I'm safe to go back
to being open. So I am very
disappointed.
And and because Hong Kong government
is very concerned about my situation
and still not understanding
about me and my family.
So I'm worried.
Thank you. Yeah.
Thank you. So I think we have a question
from microphone number seven.
Please go ahead.
Hello. Um, I was wondering,
when did it dawn on you what
you had gotten involved in and
when did you realize, um,
the gravity of the situation?
Like, I I'm imagining that it would
be difficult in the beginning.
But now with all the aftermath,
it's it's been a very big thing.
So I
like when at what point did
you realize how big this
was?
Uh. Yes.
I realize this is a very big
point, because
now the Hong Kong government is,
uh, they want
especially to my anois that,
uh, one.
One, one.
One of one of his sons,
one of them and one of his, he have
one time that immigration, the one
to deal his case
one time for dirty cases
at one time.
So my case and two other families
including so I think it's very
difficult to my lawyer and
especially
with me, because I
am very pleased that
they sent me to Philippines.
And now I also don't have
any assistance from ISIS,
the government.
So it's very hard for me
to do
is very unfair to me that
the Hong Kong government is can't rely
on my donations.
So it's a
very, very difficult
for me right now.
Maybe I can I can help a little bit with
that, Vanessa,
the what
what the what the question was.
And of course, I asked the same thing
the night when she met Edward
Snowden. She did not know who
Edward Snowden was. It was just a white
man in front of a door.
So she let him in and and let
him sleep in her bed.
There's only one bed in the apartment.
She slept on the floor.
And the next morning it was Snowden
asked her to please bring a newspaper.
And well,
I think, Vanessa, when you bought the
newspaper, maybe, maybe
I think that's what the audience wanted
to know.
That's the minute you found out you
bought a newspaper. And you see
just just tell that that morning
you experience when when you were looking
for the newspaper and what you
experienced then.
I think Vanessa.
Yes. OK, when was the
first time you realized
how big the Snowden
case was?
At what time did you know?
OK, I just find out
when the next morning
I was going to buy this paper.
This is since this is in June 2013,
correct?
Yes, June 2013.
And what what happened
in June 2013
when Edward Snowden stay at my house
and he told the
next morning, he told me that
he needed the English newspaper.
So I bought the English newspaper
with him.
And I'm really shocked.
The guy whose name
is the most wanted man in the world
because he's in the in
the front page of the newspaper.
So I'm really shocked
that the guy
is in my house.
So so
what did you do after that?
What did you think after that?
I think that I
need I
need to be careful.
And my lawyers
told me that the don't tell anyone
the that's the first
rule and don't let anyone
come to my house.
So I need to be careful
on that because I was told
and stay in my house.
So I no let
anybody not see my
house. And I'm not to anybody that
was stolen in my house.
Did you still want to help Mr. Snowden at
that time?
I yes, I'm still going
to have Edward Snowden because,
you know, I have a place to stay
and he needs my help.
And I think
I can do that for him.
I think we have another question from the
audience. Number five at the
back there. Go ahead.
Hello. Thank you for everything you've
done to Edward Snowden.
It has been mentioned that you have
celebrated his 30th birthday
together with your family and
something was mentioned about a birthday
cake. What happened there?
Oh, yeah,
I received a call and
I get the gates.
And I don't know that time
is so bright day and so
why have the cake and he said that
and there was Snowden's birthday.
So I bring
the case at my house and I
don't understand.
Oh, today's your
birthday.
And he said, yes.
So me and my daughter
and we sing a song for him
and we
blow the candles.
And
I told him I felt sorry
that they used birthday day, but we can't
afford that.
And
I think.
We have another question from the signal.
Thank you, Vanessa.
A question to you,
probably you are afraid
for your own family
after all.
Would you do it again?
Yes.
Uh, microphone two here in the
front, please ask your questions.
I'm just going to quickly break the rules
that are only questions and
there are only questions.
I wanted to thank you not only
for giving a home to Mr. Snowden,
which we all did, but also for being
here tonight and giving a face
to a lot of stories, I guess, that
we don't see usually
because we did a lot of the first part.
And and this is great because
Edward Snowden is, of course, important
and did great stuff, but also
this other part. And for being here
tonight is great for us and
for me at least.
Thanks. I can see your point, but please
question number four.
Thank you.
Apart from expressing my utmost respect
and gratitude, I have a question,
dear Vanessa, and to all the other
hosts as well.
Do I understand correctly that the
government of Hong Kong will not allow
you to travel anywhere else but back to
your home country?
Is there anything that can be done
by governments of other countries,
individuals of other countries to take
you to another place? Because it does
feel like you're being trapped in Hong
Kong and there is no good way out
either in Hong Kong or in your home
countries?
Definitely what's needed
is public support and the public
being vocal, setting
up the Facebook, social
media groups,
communicating with your local
governments.
There's no reason why,
for example, the Canadian government.
The German government.
Could not make the political decision.
Seven people, seven people
out of millions of asylum seekers in the
world.
And to offer them asylum.
That's all that's needed because they
are stuck in limbo in Hong Kong with
effectively a zero chance,
what I'll stress is
the Sri Lankans, if they're returned to
Sri Lanka, they will all be arrested
at the airport under the Prevention
the Prevention of Terrorism Act.
They'll be arbitrarily detained
and it is certain that some of them will
be tortured at
the soldier faces a death penalty
for Vanessa, the new president
of the Philippines.
Duterte has executed
extrajudicially 6000 people in the last
couple of months, and he's proposed
to set up concentration
camps to exterminate
three million drug addicts in the
Philippines.
These families have been left behind.
I'm not going to let that happen,
so it's so through
your being aware of
this, through your capabilities
to communicate through social networks,
your communities.
This is really if we could create a
groundswell, this could put
pressure on governments to
possibly have them step forward to help
these families fundraise.
The the fundraiser page,
it's written in English and French,
and
it's set out there very clearly what can
be done and what's being done in Canada.
And I have asked
my clients where their second choice
would be to seek asylum.
And all of them have talked about
Germany.
So whatever can be done to
help the fund raiser page and there's an
associated Facebook page with that,
whatever can be done would be most
appreciate.
And again, any any funds that
can be given to help the families would
obviously
ensure that they're not
left destitute in Hong Kong.
Thank you.
We are very short
on time, but I think I have the authority
to stretch that a little and I want
to take I'm sorry, I wanted to he's
standing there quite a lot of long
time. So from microphone one
place.
Um, yeah.
I basically wanted to hear from Vanessa
because she helped him.
What what kind of help would you
appreciate? What kind of help
can the world do we do to you
or give you.
If if the people
want to help
us,
I hope and I wish that
you open your heart to
the need some money
for our fund raiser and
go find me, which is a
really big house for
us.
And we are hoping
to send the
two families, three families to
another country to start our new life
and have a good future,
our children.
Thank you.
I'm very sorry.
I'm getting signs to my
that that they want to
do something to me.
So thanks
for your talks and
thank you all for
being here and making it.
It is a great
honor for me and a
big round of applause for Vanessa.
Lena Lobar Zinka.
It wasn't until about
Thibeault.
Maybe you can solve on this with
the camera.