Tags
asylum, Chartered, Chinese, DataCell, Edward Snowden, extradition, Iceland, Jet, U.S., Wikileaks
Businessman says he has a Chinese jet on standby in case Icelandic government green-lights asylum — Could leave as early as tomorrow.
An Icelandic businessman is offering to transport Edward Snowden to the island nation aboard a chartered jet if Iceland’s government grants asylum to the man who exposed the National Security Agency’s massive harvesting of Internet and phone records.
“Everything is ready on our side and the plane could take off tomorrow,” DataCell executive Olafur Sigurvinsson told Iceland’s Channel 2 television station, Agence France-Presse reports.
“We have really done all we can do. We have a plane and all the logistics in place. Now we are only awaiting a response from the [Icelandic] government,” he said. “It would be stupid to come here only to be extradited to the United States. In that case he’d be better off where he is.”