By Cliff Montgomery – Apr. 8, 2014
Edward Snowden still has stories to tell.
Today the former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor had an interesting talk with the Council of Europe, the continent’s leading human rights body. Through videolink from Moscow, Snowden informed the Council that the NSA has kept a watch on those who work for human rights groups – a probably illegal action normally condemned by U.S. officials.
“The NSA has specifically targeted either leaders or staff members in a number of civil and non-governmental organizations…including domestically within the borders of the United States,” Snowden told the Council. The former contractor did not directly state which human rights groups were targeted by the NSA.
The Council directly asked Snowden if U.S. officials had pried into the “highly sensitive and confidential communications” produced by such leading human rights bodies as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, and if they had done the same with the communications of smaller national and regional groups.
“The answer is, without question, yes. Absolutely,” Snowden declared.
Human Rights Watch was to quick to respond to these recent revelations.
“If it’s true that the NSA spied on groups like Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, it’s outrageous, and indicative of the overreach that U.S. law allows to security agencies,” declared Dinah Pokempner, who works as general counsel at Human Rights Watch (HRW).
“Such actions would again show why the U.S. needs to overhaul its system of indiscriminate surveillance,” added Pokempner.
And that wasn’t all Human Rights Watch had to say on the subject.
An HRW statement on the matter added that “protection of human rights defenders has been a priority for the U.S. State Department and such actions would fly in the face of closely held values of freedom of association and expression.”
Amnesty International also condemns such actions. In a petition created to protest the Obama Administration’s surveillance activities, Amnesty declares:
“Privacy is a human right that does not stop at one’s doorstep. It’s essential to the enjoyment of many other human rights, including the right to freedom of expression and information.
“International law, which includes standards the US helped to develop and later ratified, requires that any interference with the right to privacy must be legitimate and proportionate to the aim it’s seeking to achieve, as well as subject to judicial and congressional review,” adds Amnesty.
“Based on what leaks have already revealed, there’s no question that the breathtaking extent of the government’s surveillance of telephone and Internet communication infringes on the right to privacy,” states the Amnesty protest.
