“Former President Jimmy Carter was again critical of the National Security Agency surveillance program brought to light by fugitive leaker Edward Snowden. ‘America has no functioning democracy at this moment,’ Carter said at a closed-door event in Atlanta covered by a German newsmagazine.
No American outlets covered the event, but the quote published by Der Spiegel is in line with opinions Carter has expressed previously.
In June, just after Snowden became trapped in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo International Airport transit zone, Carter described the intelligence leak as ‘beneficial.’
‘He’s obviously violated the laws of America, for which he’s responsible, but I think the invasion of human rights and American privacy has gone too far,’ he told CNN. ‘I think that the secrecy that has been surrounding this invasion of privacy has been excessive, so I think that the bringing of it to the public notice has probably been, in the long term, beneficial.’
He added that nations were within their rights to offer Snowden asylum.”
The Der Spiegel online article (“SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL, https://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/nsa-affaere-jimmy-carter-kritisiert-usa-a-911589.html; obtained on 7-18-2013) was found to be only in the German language when the author examined it today.
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Louis DeCola, Jr. © 2013 The Hygiology Post ®