Snowden Hits Back Against Critics of NSA Leaks

Source: Reuters

Snowden hits back against critics of NSA leaks

Mon Jun 17, 2013 3:55pm EDT

Deborah Charles and Laura MacInnis

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The former National Security Agency contractor who revealed the U.S. government's top-secret monitoring of Americans' phone and Internet data fought back against his critics on Monday, saying the government's "litany of lies" about the programs compelled him to act.

Edward Snowden told an online forum run by Britain's Guardian newspaper that he considered it an honor to be called a traitor by people like former Vice President Dick Cheney, and he urged President Barack Obama to "return to sanity" and roll back the surveillance effort.

Taking questions from readers and journalists, Snowden talked about his motivations and reaction to the debate raging about the damage or virtue of the leaks. Snowden remains in hiding, reportedly in Hong Kong.

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"It was seeing a continuing litany of lies from senior officials to Congress - and therefore the American people - and the realization that Congress ... wholly supported the lies," said Snowden, who had worked at an NSA facility in Hawaii as an employee of contractor Booz Allen Hamilton before providing the details to the Guardian and Washington Post.

Snowden referred to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper's testimony to Congress in March that such a program did not exist, saying that seeing him "baldly lying to the public without repercussion is the evidence of a subverted democracy. The consent of the governed is not consent if it is not informed."

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSBRE95G0NQ20130617