Video: Snowden Wants People to Buy His Memoir and Help Those Who Saved His Life

Sept 19, 2019

After multiple books and films about his decision to leak the biggest cache of top-secret documents in history, whistleblower Edward Snowden is set to tell his side of the story in a memoir, Permanent Record.

Published on Tuesday, the book is published in more than 20 countries] and will detail how and why the former CIA agent and NSA contractor decided to reveal the US government’s plans for mass surveillance around the world and in the US – which included monitoring phone calls, text messages and emails.

Snowden’s story has been already been tackled on film and in books. He was portrayed by actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the Oliver Stone film Snowden, which was adapted from Guardian journalist Luke Harding’s book The Snowden Files. Journalist Glenn Greenwald, the source to whom he leaked his explosive story, recounted in his memoir No Place to Hide how he went to Hong Kong in 2013 to meet an anonymous source who claimed to have evidence of government spying. Snowden was also the subject of the 2014 documentary Citizenfour, directed by Laura Poitras, and the 2016 play Wild, a fictionalised take on his story.

But with the release of the Oliver Stone film "Snowden" in 2016, the people who hosted and helped Snowden in Hong Kong are being persecuted by Hong Kong authorities. Arrested on several occasions, they have been questioned about their ties with Snowden. The little welfare they received from the government has been cut. Today, they all live in constant fear in Hong Kong. If deported to their home country of Sri Lanka, they could face imprisonment, torture and even death. All of them have applied for asylum in Canada.

Snowden told FRANCE 24 he believes he owes his life to these unexpected allies, who could have turned him in at any time: “They could have written an email to the CIA and they could have gotten a big cheque or they could have finally gotten asylum in exchange. But they would have had to do it by selling someone into a grave. And for that, I’ll never be able to repay them.”

The refugees are surviving thanks to donations received through a non-profit organisation called ‘For the refugees’. For the Refugees is a Canadian not-for-profit organisation fighting for the rights of political refugees and asylum seekers who have made an exceptional contribution to society but face great personal danger as a result.

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