Cheney: Edward Snowden May Be Spying for Chinese Government
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JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) — Former Vice President Dick Cheney called NSA leaker Edward Snowden a “traitor,” during an appearance on Fox News Sunday this weekend, and warned that he may be spying for the Chinese government.
“I think he’s a traitor,” the former vice president said. “I think he has committed crimes in effect by violating agreements given the position he had.”
Cheney, who defended the NSA’s domestic spying program, said the leak was one of the worst in recent memory, and did serious damage to the national security interests of the United States. He expressed concern over the fact that Snowden fled to China of all places.
“I’m deeply suspicious obviously because he went to China, that’s not a place where you ordinarily want to go if you’re interested in freedom and liberty and so forth,” Cheney said.
“I am very, very worried that he still has additional information that he hasn’t released yet, that the Chinese would welcome the opportunity and probably willing to provide immunity for him or sanctuary for him, if you will, in exchange for what he presumably knows or doesn’t know,” he continued.
“I don’t think this is just a one-off disclosure. I think there’s a real danger here that he’ll go beyond that.”
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