Reports Snowden Is in Talks to Return Home Are “Much Ado About Nothing,” Says U.S. Lawyer

by Kia Makarechi

Reports on Tuesday that Edward Snowden is in talks to return to the United States are exaggerated, the N.S.A. whistleblower’s top American lawyer told VF.com.

Speaking at a conference in Moscow, Snowden’s lawyer in Russia, Anatoly Kucherena, said legal teams in Russia, Germany, and the United States are “doing everything possible now to solve this issue [of Snowden’s return to the U.S.].”

While Kucherena's comments received considerable pickup, Snowden’s representatives have long maintained both that the N.S.A. whistleblower wants to return to the United States, and that he will not do so under the threat of unfair prosecution.

“This is much ado about nothing,” Ben Wizner, the director of the A.C.L.U.’s Speech, Privacy & Technology Project and Snowden’s head legal counsel in the United States, told VF.com in an e-mail. “Just [Snowden’s] Russian lawyer paraphrasing what [Snowden] has always said: that he would return to the U.S. if a fair trial were available.”

Snowden’s wishes don't exactly mesh with the current political climate in the United States, and he does not have immediate plans to return home. The Obama administration has not indicated that it would pardon the felonies Snowden is charged with.

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http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/03/snowden-talks-to-return-us