Do we unfriend Portugal and France?

/ July 2, 2013
Amiguinhos nao mais

Amiguinhos nao mais

The latest (alleged) twist in the Snowden saga strains belief.

Apparently, rumors circulated that Evo Morales would be carrying Edward Snowden in his Presidential plane following Evo’s trip to Moscow. According to the Bolivian government, the governments of France and Portugal, spurred on by the US government, refused to allow the presidential plane permission to fly over their respective territories. Morales’ plane had to stop in Vienna to refuel, and they are now calculating the best way to get home.

Morales is furious, and so is (obviously) Venezuela. After all, Venezuela is to Bolivia as Cuba is to Venezuela, so an offense to Evo is like an offense to Cilia.

The weird thing is that these folks are mad at Portugal and France, two countries that welcomed Nicolás Maduro a few weeks ago with open arms. Let’s not forget that the government of Portugal is going to (insert laugh track here) build a new highway to La Guaira!

So, what now? Is this going to be the excuse as to why the highway will never get made? I’d love to see the government try to sell that line to the beleaguered Vargas commuters who must withstand hours of traffic each way, every day. “We were going to make a new highway, see, but then this thing with Evo Morales’ plane happened, and … do you know what Wikileaks is?”

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84 thoughts on “Do we unfriend Portugal and France?”

  3. I can’t believe France and Portugal would close their air space over some loose rumour that perhaps maybe Snowden was on that flight. My guess is the population of Moscow Airport is now about 75% CIA spies. If they went that far, that guy is in that airplane.

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    • Given the current competence of the CIA, you may as well have said “My guess is the population of Moscow Airport is now about 75% clowns in the Ringling Brothers Circus.”

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    • Anyways, it is surprising to me all the fuzz this snowden case has generated, the US goverment needs to improve their cara e’ tabla a bit more in the future

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      • People need to scrutinize more the relationship between exiting bosses of NSA/CIA and spoofing contractors and other companies and they need to make more use of cryptography

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  4. “Venezuela is to Bolivia as Cuba is to Venezuela, so an offense to Evo is like an offense to Cilia”. Hilarious comment Juan!

    Indeed, the guy must be in that plane.

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    • Question 1: Is Morales’ plane, technically, Bolivian soil?

      Question 2: So, if they enter French airspace without permission, what can actually happen? Certainly they wouldn’t be shot down!

      Question 3: There’s no way Snowden is *this* valuable, is there?

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      • Q1: No.
        Q2: It certainly can. I doubt it would happen, but it’s entirely possible, even legal.
        Q3: No way to know.

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      • Just to question 3: of course not. Virtually everything, everything he has revealed so far has been known for years. The only exception I can think of are the specific names of some of the programmes. They could have been called “Peter”, “John” and “Mary”, it would be the same.

        That they existed and do as described (and more) has been published over and over again in well-known media outlets, only not in such a way that the masses pay attention.

        The only thing is that all those governments have so far pretended as if they didn’t know and they want to do so because it’s good to some business interests serving, nurturing and being served and nurtured by the defence ministries and state intelligence organisations.

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      • Question 1: Technically, not even an embassy is the “soil” of the country that occupies it. However, the distinctions are subtle and for most purposes, it is close enough. Though the planes of foreign heads of state are afforded some limited privileges against being searched, they don’t even come close to the level of protection afforded an embassy.

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    • It’s really hard to predict how crazy it could get. If I were el Chigüire I’d go with: Asamblea Nacional aprueba matrimonio igualitario para que Maduro se case con Snowden.

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  7. It’s very good to know that authoritarians can be the receivers of arbitrary rules set by a higher authority, indeed karma is a bitch.

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  8. Putin said on Monday that Russia was ready to shelter Snowden as long as he stopped leaking U.S. secrets. At the same time, Putin said he had no plans to turn over Snowden to the United States.

    In moscow’s airport they gambled for my leaks,
    I bargained for asylum and they gave me a morales,
    I offered up my innocence and got repaid with masduro,
    “Come in” she said
    “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”.

    Well I’m living in a foreign country but I’m bound to cross the line
    Secrets are still on the razor’s edge someday I’ll make them mine
    “Come in” she said
    “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”.

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    • Suddenly I wet dreamed and she was standing there
      With silver bracelets on her wrists and flowers in her hair
      She walked up to me so gracefully and took my crown of thorns
      “Come in” she said
      “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”.

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      • Snowden first made contact with documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras in January 2013.
        Snowden revealed the existence and functions of several classified US surveillance programs and their scope, including notably PRISM (surveillance program), NSA call database, Boundless Informant. He also revealed details of Tempora, a British black-ops surveillance program run by the NSA’s British partner, GCHQ.

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  9. The whole affair is so strange. A few things that come to my mind:

    1) I bet we’ll hear a lot of people taking about ICAO’s “Freedoms of the air”. Run away from such experts, because ICAO’s rules ONLY apply to civil aviation. Diplomatic aircraft fall in the “official aviation” category (like warplanes), and they are covered by different, very specific treaties.

    2) The reports state that the flight was Moscow-Canary Islands. There is no way Morales plane was endangered by the refusal to overfly France, unless the aircraft had mechanical problems or the pilots are morons. With the fuel required to fly that trip, the airplane may have flown Moscow-Vienna-Moscow-and-again-Vienna, and still had some fuel to spare.

    To check it yourself, use the airport codes UUEE (Moscow-Sheremetyevo), GCLP (Gran Canarias) and LOWW (Vienna), and have some fun here:

    http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?DU=km&P=UUEE-GCLP

    3) I bet that for the USA it is a lot easier to fetch Snowden from Bolivia than from Russia, so why the big fuss?. Flexing some diplomatic muscle?.

    4) I wonder if, in the end, the whole thing has more to do with the following news than with Snowden:

    http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hmBYUm8BTaUNfhqLH36vkXm0SG5A

    You know: This story comes from the airplane of the same guy that proudly declared that eating chicken makes you gay…

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    • The French have confirmed there was a prohibition of landing in their territory and so, it seems, in Portugal and Spain. As far as I remember, the Canary Islands is Spanish territory.

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      • The issue is sooo bizarre that indeed it looks a lot more like what would happen if someone forgot to request in advance overfly permission for an official aircraft.

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        • Dago, are you trying to put the blame on Morales and do not think for a moment it is US pressure? I mean: I know problems with coordination, planning and so on happen all the time on the part of the Bolivian and Venezuelan governments but don’t you think for a moment here we might be dealing with simple US pressure?
          Just saying.

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          • I’m willing to entertain that possibility, on the condition that you’re also willing to entertain the (much wider) probability set that the affair has very little to do with the USA.

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            • Sure. Now: why on Earth wouldn’t it have to do with the US (and Britain)?

              If a country X within the European Union does not want to accept a refugee, they simply stop him at immigration. It is not like Morales will let Snowden parachute somewhere.

              Now, let’s imagine he would land in Paris and then Snowden goes out and wants to stay in Paris. The authorities could simply deny him entry. Why wouldn’t they do that?

              My impression – and I am open to other interpretations – is that the large majority of Western Europeans don’t see any problem with letting him in. The governments do.
              Why? “Because they think that could harm their interests”.
              How? Was he revealing secrets of France, Italy or the like? If anything, it would be because they don’t want a spat with the United States and the population would ask why
              their own governments don’t demand less snooping on and data mining of very private data by the US and Britain.

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          • Here you have Le Monde:
            http://www.lemonde.fr/ameriques/article/2013/07/03/une-rumeur-sur-snowden-provoque-une-crise-diplomatique-entre-paris-et-la-paz_3440849_3222.html

            “Après vérification, Vienne confirme que Snowden ne se trouve pas à bord. La France, le Portugal puis l’Italie autorisent finalement, dans la nuit, le survol de leur territoire.”

            And look here:
            http://www.abc.es/agencias/noticia.asp?noticia=1450797
            Italy still has the prohibition. Why would Italy have explicitly put that prohibition? It is not that the plane didn’t have permission but had a prohibition.

            For all I care, perhaps Snowden was in the toilette or in the hand baggage compartments, but it seems to me several countries just closed their air space because of Snowden.

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            • An important difference between “civil aviation” aircraft (covered by ICAO rules) and “official” aircraft, is that for the later the “prohibition” to overfly is the “default” state. This makes plenty of sense because, as I explained before, warplanes are “official” aircraft too, and you don’t want foreign warplanes flying above you without your express permission.

              Therefore, Italy has not PUT a prohibition on Morales airplane. It just has not temporarily LIFTED the prohibition. Again, this makes sense, because the flight path Moscow-Canary Islands doesn’t pass over Italy.

              In my opinion, the whole issue has to do with Snowden, but not with direct USA meddling. European governments just want to make sure that Snowden stay far from their borders, so he remains as someone else’s problem.

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              • OK, let’s say perhaps Morales’ plane didn’t have enough fuel. Or perhaps Morales wanted to buy the famous Austrian Sachertorte. Or he wanted to show up in the news. Or all of the above. In any case I hope soon people discuss more about the old but constantly forgotten “news” on the degree of snooping and, more importantly, what private groups have access to the data and how this technology is developed.
                That’s all I have to say.

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    • I found a news article that may shed some light into this weird affair. It comes from the ABC from Spain (not my favorite news source, by the way):

      http://www.abc.es/internacional/20130702/abci-snowden-maduro-espana-201307021752.html

      In a nutshell, it looks like the Snowden asylum petition to several countries was rejected on the grounds that it must be requested from within the country’s territory. Therefore, some governments could be worried about Snowden forcing them to consider the asylum by just hoping out of Evo’s airplane when landing somewhere along the Moscow-La Paz trip.

      Given that Snowden whereabouts are currently unknown, and Maduro is still on Belarus, this whole show may repeat itself in a few days.

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      • 1. The Geneva Convention on Refugees only requires that refugee claimants be “outside the country of their citizenship or former habitual residence”. Many countries process what amount to asylum applications byvisiting refugee camps, ie. In Africa, and bringing the chosen ones to the new country.

        2. Am I the only one who remembers D.B. Cooper?

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    • Good point about the US preferring Snowden in Bolivia than Russia. Supposedly, they’ve been trying to convince the Russians to deport him to another country. That way, Russia doesn’t look like they backed down and the leadership doesn’t anger the Russian people who are sympathetic to Snowden.

      Snowden is trouble to whoever takes him in. Suggesting they would put Ecuador under a microscope by the world press. Ecuadoran whistle blowers said they were “inspired by Snowden” and passed on papers suggesting Correa plans to indulge in his own domestic surveillance. But that might have been CIA pranksters making a point.

      I can’t understand why Snowden didn’t take asylum in Russia just so he could get travel documents to go somewhere else. He seems incredibly stupid and stubborn. A Russian girl online says that all kinds of national airlines are putting out their own orders to refuse to carry him like the British did. Even Iceland.

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      • It wouldn’t be surprising: if they do fly him, they get problems with the US Americans and last but not least with the Britons.

        As for what Snowden said: there is hardly anything he said that was not known. The only thing is that now a few across the masses are thinking about the issue, whereas before those who knew it were less.
        There have been quite some authoritative publications about how these nations have been spying everywhere

        A few of the main differences now with earlier times are:

        1) now they are using all our private data – big data – to infer quite a lot about their rivals and rivals are all the other countries. This was not the case before the Internet revolution.
        2) private companies such as Booz and Lockheed Martin’s friends are where not only heads of NSA and CIA end up working but also thousands of other public employees. They come and go and they are the ones deciding about “security” priorities.
        This has become much much worse than it was before. Just compare the CVs of the latest heads of said organisations with what you had before.

        This will continue but I hope more and more people are aware of the degree in which economic interests are violating any information law to use your data. It’s not that “one does not have anything to hide”. It’s whether one wants to get one’s private data be used by Lockheed Martin et alia in one way or the other.

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        • Oh, yes. Privacy is a world problem, not a USA problem. What bothers me is that people only worry about the government abuse. If a corporation can legally collect the metadata, there will not be much difference in the abuses.

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          • Kris,

            It depends to whom you talk. I mine data all the data. There are huge ethical questions one needs to bear in mind.
            I never liked the way Google is using my data. I am aware of what kind of actions I do when I use Google services. But Google cannot (not yet) compare that information with the frequencies and connections of my phone calls, with my trips to Italy, with my
            credit card and with the money movements.
            Google cannot do that to the EU top officials’ private data and on top of that listen to their conversations about what strategies they will follow to support EU products, help or not Airbus and so on.

            Another point is that the problem here also has to do with amigo politics: it’s a collusion of state with private companies tapping on this data.

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      • ‘That way, Russia doesn’t look like they backed down and the leadership doesn’t anger the Russian people who are sympathetic to Snowden.’

        There are very few people who are sympathetic to Snowden in Russia. It is all about Putin not looking like he gave in to the US, or the West. It would ruin his standing and authority as Russia’s strong man and nationalist leader.

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    • 1800 internet users is about 95% of the state.

      I almost went to medical school in Albuquerque, but after visiting for interviews in spring/summer, I realized I’d shortly be suicidal within 6 months of moving there.

      I’d rather be trapped in an airport in Russia for the forseeable future.

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  12. I still love Correa’s humiliating public reversal. The US probably said no chance they continue the favorable trade agreement with Ecaudor (which Ecuador benefits greatly from) that is due to expire if he Ecuador accepts Snowden.

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    • I loved that too, so much bullshit they talk about being sovereigns and the evil empire and etc… that was epic.

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  14. Surely any communication to and from the tower would be recorded so there is no need for this “He said, she said” charade?

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  15. What have we learned from the Evo airplane story? The main thing is that if the US says to supposedly European sovereign nations, “JUMP!”, they don’t just say yes, but ask “HOW HIGH!”. This proves what snivelling rats they really are.

    It’s easy to bully a small country such as Bolivia. Hoe courageous.

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  16. Unfortunately I have to side with Evo and Bolivia on this one.

    France and Portugal behaved miserably, as accomplices and serfs to the interests of wrongdoers. Even if Snowden were on that plane drinking with Evo.

    But no crisis, manufactured or otherwise should come of this. For any of the involved.

    Not on the part of the U.S. of A. which is giving one of the most shameful showings in its history in hunting a whistleblower who exposed evidence of violations of the rights of the citizens of the U.S.A. and many other countries. Not on the part of Venezuela of all countries.

    In fact this, with the Assange episode, make me begin to wonder if the U.S. of A. has become a police state, or will become one soon.

    Snowden does deserve refuge. For he is persecuted for exposing an unconstitutional (and secret, I don’t frankly know which is more criminal) system of indiscriminate surveillance of the private communications of citizens of the U.S.A. and other nations. Me and hundreds of millions included. Too bad that no decent democracy is ready to stand up to arm twisting by a U.S. of A. when it turns bad, and that he has to appeal to people such as Rafael Correa and Evo Morales.

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    • Snowden does deserve refuge, but in an american prison, period. Sorry to burst your bubble of self righteous and correctness.

      It was not simply his place to leak details about this program, more to the point, he is ostensibly carrying with him a whole lot of classified material, where he solely decides what material will be leaked or not, that’s just a supreme arrogance of the crazy. Also there are unconfirmed reports that he let the Chinese and Russians to make copy of such sensitive and classified material, that crime is treason against the country and if he is found guilty he would face the death penalty.

      Snowden claims to be fighting for freedom of speech, while hiding and seeking asylum in countries where freedom of speech is under attack or nonexistent, mind you that he is praising the President of Ecuador for his bravery and commitment for freedom of speech. Clearly the guy needs some advice and more common sense on his political statements. Personally I think he is just a nut-job with a complex of superiority.

      If I were him, I would have leaked that info in the country, and face the consequences in the country, for my there is no reason for this whole charade of going to Ecuador or staying in Russia.

      All the things that Snowden said about Prism is a secret that is not so secret. What will come out of this is the hypocrisy of Obama, everybody is remembering how he criticized Bush for creating secretive programs, and he wind up keeping and increasing the power of the secret programs he fiercely opposed for electoral purposes.

      For that reason, I think Obama should resign and step down.

      Finally I will give credibility to wikileaks when they release diplomatic cables of the USRR, the Russia of Putin, China oh and Brazil of course. Other than that they are just a front for anti-american group.

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      • well said. Especially liked your last paragraph. Not sure if the case is strong enough for Obama to resign.

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        • About Obama that’s only my thinking, I admit the case is not strong enough, so it should put in perspective the contradiction of the Senator Obama that fought the Bush administration, and the President Obama, that acknowledges that this kind of secret programs are necessary to prevent any other terrorist attack in American soil.

          Looks like the perception of the world changes depending of the chair you are seating.

          My only take against PRISM, is about its capacity to prevent terrorist attacks, is too much data to sift through, too much data to handle, too much data to store, one has to wonder if NSA are doing the equivalent of catching the sun with a hand.

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      • I think Snowden should have done as other whistle blowers in the USA did, face things in the USA…just like Thomas Andrews Drake.

        That’s not pretty but that should have been done so.
        Nothing but the names of the programmes were new to anyone working in data mining or Internet security/cryptography or just interested in SIGINT and to quite a few others. You didn’t need secret clearance for that.

        Very tragically and even though there have been quite some good reports about the amount of spoofing going on (including the Jimmy Carter submarine recently on German TV), it has only now come to most people’s attention…also a pity the attention is on an individual.

        As for the USA and Britain: it’s good they will have a harder time to be complaining about others spying them.

        Former and very notorious CIA head Tenet is working for QinetQ and L-1 Identity solutions now, which are earning a huge amount of money from CIA etc.
        Former CIA head Woosley is working for Booz Allen, which is also earning a huge amount from all those agencies (that’s where Snowden was working at the end)
        NSA head Inman is now working top at Academi, which is former Blackwater (the more than notorious Blackwater).

        These are just the top.
        There are thousands of others who come and go from these agencies. This is happening there as never before.
        A company needs to grow. Guess how they do that here. Guess what the implications are for the focus on “war on terror” and all the rest.

        The US and Britain are carrying out highly aggressive commercial spying even against its NATO partners. Are others doing the same? To a degree (Israel is pretty on top there).

        Now, what I really find repulsive is that these “unions” of commercial with “institutional” interests are using OUR very private data for their data mining. It sucks already when Facebook and Google do use every single part of our data (most people don’t care, I know). But it gets to a new dimension when the data is crossed against everything else by these organisations in the name of “terror fighting”.

        The big data they are gaining – using every single bit of our data – is for their commercial interests.

        And curiously, that data doesn’t seem to help them to foresee major changes – like
        the Arab turmoil (aka Arab spring) going on in the last few years. But it is already very useful for other things, including gaining more contracts.

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        • I agree. I respect the principles behind Snowden’s revelation (the US population tends to be suspicious of government overreach and rightly so) but the fact he fled to China and Russia, two countries that undoubtedly sent intelligence agents out to greet him when he arrived, shows that his loyalties are a bit in doubt. Daniel Ellsberg back in the 70s revealed info on the Vietnam War that needed to be revealed but he faced the music in the US.

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        • Agreed with you, most people don’t complain about the fact that their “private” data are being used for commercial purposes, even they can tolerate being constantly spammed by online ads everywhere, but raise their voice when the government does use part of your private data for security reasons, maybe I sound naive but I think this is the price we have to pay to avoid seeing every day in the newspaper the casualties and deaths caused by terrorist attacks in major cities of North America and Western Europe.

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          • Jctt,

            I think you did NOT get what I said. CIA, NSA and all the others serve primarily commercial and then ideological purposes. Some do so more than others.
            What I mean is that they are using our data in a more shameless way than Google et alia, also because they have full access to financial records, security records, all the rest and they scan all our digital data.

            You just have to analyse the careers of the top echelons of those “state” organisations and how they move to their contractors. And they relish on the “war on terror”, which means more money for their contractors, which will become their companies.

            The “terrorist fight” is just a tiny part of it all.

            If you want to reduce the terrorist attacks, you should pay more attention on not letting people like Academi (aka BLACKWATER) carry out the shameless violence they carry out in invaded countries of dictators your country helped to stay in power.
            Oh, by the way: the previous head of NSA is now on the board of directors of Academi.

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            • Sorry Kepler if I didn’t make myself clear, I’m not denying the fact that the so called prism project is being used for commercial purposes.

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          • Only that you can opt out of private use of your data. And they have to actually use it in an anonymous way.

            Commercial purposes does not equal violent, even deadly purposes, you might object to.

            This kind of indiscriminate surveillance is like having a permanent backdoor built especially for a particularly dangerous class of online criminals.

            And I seriously doubt that they will prevent squat. On the contrary, it’s my belief that the War on Terror has spurred terrorism on, in the same way that the War on Drugs has made drug traffic infinitely deadlier and infinitely more dangerous than what it was before.

            Can you voluntarily opt out of secret government surveillance? If so, you must tell me how!

            The naivete you have to hear about…

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            • As far as I can recall, The Great Iraqi Cock-up was related to two great terrorist acts (and massacres) in Europe, at least. And is still causing untold death in Iraq. And did wonders for Al-Qaeda recruiting.

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            • The how I completely debunk your soso argument is to inform you that opting out of this so called free services does not mean that the information that you previously shared will be completely erased in the cloud. There is always a trail behind. You’d better inform yourself before stating ridiculous comments.

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              • At least, commercial services can be limited by law governing their behavior. No such limits for spooks operating under what is basically a secret code of law, under secret courts, and under oversight by a few parliamentarians bound to secrecy.

                At least, commercial services have their reputations to think of, and the pledges they made to users to think of. They can’t build secret anything, for example a secret backdoor into our communications. Their very trying something secret, not expressly allowed by users would be delinquent behavior, not “defending us” from terrorists. That would result in lawsuits and a lot of custom and money lost.

                At least, whistleblowers outing fishy practices by commercial services would possibly face a civil lawsuit, not a full manhunt and fearing for their freedom and possibly their own lives.

                Nevermind the deadly purposes involved, like blowing up people to bits in other countries with a missile from a drone…

                Do not equate apricots with prickly pears.

                But how exactly can you opt out of government surveillance that strong arms ISPs and uses even the servers making the backbone of the internet? Only good encryption of everything and hiding your IP address, I guess.

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      • I am torn in this issue whether to say Snowden is a hero that needs to be protected or a criminal, I think what’s happening is that nobody (as to France and Portugal, countries that take diplomacy seriously) wants to get involve into something that can become into an unnecessary diplomatic quarrel with the US, That guy is not that important for them to risk it, you know, at least I see it that way. But I tent to agree with you jctt about the hypocrisy of this administration and all the shit it’s happening.

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      • Treason my ass. He is overstepping any authority he might have. To be idiotically law-abiding, let’s say Snowden gets five to ten years in federal prison for leaking classified documents, though. Happy? Even then, no reason to mount a manhunt that no democracy should mount. Including multiple violations, even against the safety of a foreign president (I don’t like Evo either, but still his plane ought not to be endangered) on rumors. As for him selling something to Russia or China, they are rumors. Just that. Probably inventions of a propaganda machine.

        As a citizen it’s his duty AND HIS PLACE to make public criminal actions that -aggravating circumstance- are being hidden behind a veil of official secrecy. And I don’t care if anyone’s motives be “pure” or not, not his, and specially not those of the NSA. Or that I have nothing that could possibly interest “them”. It’s such a huge complex of criminal acts, against tens if not hundreds of millions of persons. Too bad nobody will come to trial for that, and face serious jail time for that.

        PRISM, if done against US citizens is clearly unconstitutional, and probably violates ALL the legislation based on the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution of the U.S.A. And through coercion of companies dealing with our personal information to boot. Creating backdoors that could be exploited for other equally criminal purposes (as if this wasn’t criminal enough!).

        Done against citizens of other countries, it is a hostile act. Probably a violation of their rights, which should be looked into by these same countries, if they want to keep the pretense of protecting their own citizens. That includes me.

        It is simply not done, to collect private communications or any data related to them that could lead to them or to a person. Not without probable cause, with the approval of a competent court, approving a properly filed investigation, against a named suspect for instances of infringement of criminal laws on the book, if criminal codes allows it. Else, come out of the closet, U.S.A. and join China and all the other proud police states of the world.

        And I say, worse for Russia and China, if no intelligence analyst in those countries has the courage and genuine patriotism that Manning and Snowden have shown, or the courage that the Wikileaks staff have. That’s why, that’s why they won’t stand a chance to reach the knees of the U.S.A. Their own problems with secrecy and abuse of power rot them.

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  17. I agree with loroferoz. And I think this reeks of U.S. imperialism and racism. Would they ever do this to a European or North American president? Never.

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    • Snowden is a U.S. citizen, who is wanted for crimes committed in the U.S. To have the Security Clearance he did, he signed documents acknowledging that what he did was a Felony. Plus, there is evidence that he had planned this even before he got the job, meaning that he would have signed those documents knowing that that he was going to abrogate his agreements.

      Is the U.S. government pissed off? Hell, yes they are! And, they want to prosecute him. So, is the U.S. using its clout to get him? Of course, they are! I don’t see that as “imperialism”. In this case, any country that gets in the way is doing its own “meddling” in U.S. internal affairs.

      As for “racism”, where the hell did that come from?

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      • Nobody had to deny permission to land to an airplane, even if there were footage of Snowden drinking Margaritas with Evo aborad the plane. It’s pure bullying.

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        • Sorry but FUCK THAT! Aren’t Correa and Evo exactly the guys perpetually ranting about SOVERANIIIIIIIAAAAAA!!

          Isn’t Correa the guy who denied Porfirio Lobo use of Ecuadorean air space in 2010?!

          Nobody has a RIGHT to use a sovereign country’s airspace. That’s just a made up thing.

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          • So: because they were doing it this is NOT bullying? If you set your standards that high, you are going to win some Olympic medals on standards.
            They definitely had the right to force Evo not to cross the air space but usually countries don’t do that as a random act. Was the reason security? Like Snowden was bound to parachute?
            They had the right to bully, that’s true. And sure enough, that’s what they did.

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          • PRECISELY!!!

            Are there supposed to be standards? Do tell me.

            If not, okay. Let’s all the nations be utter jerks, without even the traditional courtesies that prevented jerk-hood from being lethal and from causing wars. Who cares?

            There’s no right, as such. But there should be better reasons than rumors for removing all courtesy, especially in a case where you might be forcing the target of said discourtesy to ask for an emergency landing permission elsewhere.

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    • Not sure if any American or European president would be playing the big pendejos in Moscow trying to see how they will smuggle the Snowden man. They probably would have done it smarter or under other ways.

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      • I personally think that even if Evo was so foolish, some advisers might have dissuaded him from it. They were just playing around with him for offering asylum to a persecuted man. About the few good things he does from time to time, along with trying to decriminalize coca leaves.

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  19. The soap opera continues: the Austrian control tower records show that the Bolivian pilot reported a problem with the fuel measurement system, prompting the landing in Vienna, and now this:

    http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2013/07/05/actualidad/1373013708_701261.html

    And in the meanwhile, a lot of people discuss about this issue taking for granted what Evo and his aides declared, without contrasting the facts with other sources.

    I guess it is a lot more juicy to talk about an humilliation to a sudamerican president by the evil USA and its european minions, than to consider that a moron made a mistake, then an asshole talked talked too much about what he knew too little about, and finally a savvy polititian came up with a conspiracy theory in the middle of a politically charged environment to bolster his popularity on his homeland.

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