1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:19,330 *36C3 preroll music* 2 00:00:19,330 --> 00:00:23,020 Robert Tibbo: Thank you for your patience tonight. It was a little bit hectic in my 3 00:00:23,020 --> 00:00:30,380 getting here on time. So I do apologize. But thank you for all being here tonight. 4 00:00:30,380 --> 00:00:36,950 Myself and the Snowden refugees, Mr. Snowden, we really appreciate your 5 00:00:36,950 --> 00:00:42,060 attendance here. The people watching the livestream and the support for my 6 00:00:42,060 --> 00:00:54,590 clients. And just very briefly, in case there are a few people out there, I met 7 00:00:54,590 --> 00:01:00,610 Mr. Snowden in 2013, June in Hong Kong. And that's when he made the globally 8 00:01:00,610 --> 00:01:06,270 significant disclosures of the Five Eyes electronic mass surveillance program. And 9 00:01:06,270 --> 00:01:12,640 it was at that time that I represented Mr. Snowden in Hong Kong. And thereafter. And 10 00:01:12,640 --> 00:01:21,320 it was also at that time that I asked for brave adults, incredibly courageous adults 11 00:01:21,320 --> 00:01:27,400 who exercised decisions of conscience to provide Mr. Snowden with a refuge, with 12 00:01:27,400 --> 00:01:34,990 shelter, humanity, compassion and caring. And to introduce them again. Briefly, 13 00:01:34,990 --> 00:01:41,970 Vanessa, on the left, if you're facing the screen from the Philippines to her right. 14 00:01:41,970 --> 00:01:51,730 To her left. A military deserter from Sri Lanka. Nadeka from Sri Lanka. And on the 15 00:01:51,730 --> 00:01:58,310 far, far left supporting from Sri Lanka. And these are the three children. On the 16 00:01:58,310 --> 00:02:09,170 bottom left is Keana, and beside her is her stepsister, Satyamdi. And support is 17 00:02:09,170 --> 00:02:23,170 holding a little boy Dinath. *Applause* 18 00:02:23,170 --> 00:02:28,100 What what I'm gonna do this evening before providing a brief update on the Snowden 19 00:02:28,100 --> 00:02:35,850 refugee status. I'm gonna go through a bit of law, I think, at this stage. There's 20 00:02:35,850 --> 00:02:41,060 been such marginalization, demonization, confusion about what refugees are and 21 00:02:41,060 --> 00:02:46,980 what, you know, what is required to qualify as a refugee. I'm gonna go through 22 00:02:46,980 --> 00:02:52,890 a number of international law and at the same time. Beyond that, I'm gonna go 23 00:02:52,890 --> 00:02:57,170 through what's happening globally and in my view, where we're really at a crisis in 24 00:02:57,170 --> 00:03:05,341 terms of authoritarian leaders democratically elected and ignoring their 25 00:03:05,341 --> 00:03:11,810 constitutions, violating them, blatantly ignoring international law. So very 26 00:03:11,810 --> 00:03:16,450 briefly, I've just listed some of the most crucial or core conventions that protect 27 00:03:16,450 --> 00:03:21,450 human rights from the U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights to the UN 28 00:03:21,450 --> 00:03:27,060 Convention Against Torture. And of course, the UN Convention relating to the Status 29 00:03:27,060 --> 00:03:31,890 of Refugees and its protocol. I'm also mentioning the Rome Statute of the 30 00:03:31,890 --> 00:03:36,750 International Criminal Court, because this is a court where this court itself is now 31 00:03:36,750 --> 00:03:41,550 being attacked by states around the world, nations around the world. I'm also 32 00:03:41,550 --> 00:03:48,070 mentioning customary international law, which is an international norm, where due 33 00:03:48,070 --> 00:03:55,381 to practice, the practice becomes so pervasive that countries no need, no 34 00:03:55,381 --> 00:04:01,230 longer need to sign up to an international treaty. That treaty becomes part of 35 00:04:01,230 --> 00:04:08,300 customary law. It doesn't have to be written anywhere. Now, the core document 36 00:04:08,300 --> 00:04:15,660 I'm going to discuss is the Refugee Convention and Article 33 and some are sub 37 00:04:15,660 --> 00:04:21,820 paragraph one is the core. It's the core part of refugee protection and that is no 38 00:04:21,820 --> 00:04:32,160 state shall expel return. And the legal word is refoul means to return. So no 39 00:04:32,160 --> 00:04:36,449 state is going to should return any refugee. And that also includes any 40 00:04:36,449 --> 00:04:42,539 refugee claimant out of their jurisdiction where their life or freedom are at risk, 41 00:04:42,539 --> 00:04:49,520 and that the life and freedom also includes any serious harm. And there 42 00:04:49,520 --> 00:04:56,839 are five fundamental grounds to secure refugee status, race, religion, 43 00:04:56,839 --> 00:05:02,479 nationality and political opinion. These are the classical four. There's a fifth 44 00:05:02,479 --> 00:05:07,000 called social group. And it's not a closed end category. It's actually open 45 00:05:07,000 --> 00:05:13,469 ended because as you know, over time, we recognize that different human rights 46 00:05:13,469 --> 00:05:18,320 abuses occur affecting different social groups that don't fall into the four 47 00:05:18,320 --> 00:05:27,629 classic categories. So just a review just to interpret Article 33. As I 48 00:05:27,629 --> 00:05:33,400 mentioned, liberty and life also includes serious harm. It's a forward looking test. 49 00:05:33,400 --> 00:05:37,600 So if an asylum seeker or refugee crosses a border into another country, they don't 50 00:05:37,600 --> 00:05:47,189 need to prove that they actually suffered any harm or any threats or any risks or 51 00:05:47,189 --> 00:05:50,979 any threats or harms or loss of liberty or serious harm before they leave their 52 00:05:50,979 --> 00:05:56,879 jurisdiction into another jurisdiction. That person has to show they're unable or 53 00:05:56,879 --> 00:06:01,299 unwilling to seek help from the police or the state. And that's quite often the case 54 00:06:01,299 --> 00:06:06,509 because of corruption or the state itself is the persecutor. And there must be a 55 00:06:06,509 --> 00:06:18,239 nexus to one of the five grounds. I'm going to focus on political opinion and 56 00:06:18,239 --> 00:06:23,159 political opinion can be expressed by an individual verbally through their physical 57 00:06:23,159 --> 00:06:31,090 actions. The presence with others and political opinion is connected to the 58 00:06:31,090 --> 00:06:34,499 right of freedom of expression. And one thing I would stress is that freedom of 59 00:06:34,499 --> 00:06:39,270 expression under the law is not just your right to say something. It's also your 60 00:06:39,270 --> 00:06:43,099 right to receive information, to be present, to be able to hear and listen or 61 00:06:43,099 --> 00:06:48,949 record. And the freedom of expression connects fundamentally to freedom of 62 00:06:48,949 --> 00:07:02,429 association, assembly and mobility. Lot of people misunderstand that persecution for 63 00:07:02,429 --> 00:07:09,019 political opinion is the persecutor. Is that the opinion comes from the persecuted 64 00:07:09,019 --> 00:07:17,779 person. In fact. The Refugee Convention clearly states, it is the opinion of the 65 00:07:17,779 --> 00:07:25,429 persecutor that counts. So, for example, I've had clients from South Asia. One case 66 00:07:25,429 --> 00:07:30,580 was of a farmer who just had no political opinion, but was at a rally in a public 67 00:07:30,580 --> 00:07:34,860 place and just was standing on a corner and was unaware there was a political 68 00:07:34,860 --> 00:07:42,619 opponent standing near him. Those in power saw my client. Inferred that my client 69 00:07:42,619 --> 00:07:47,830 must be supporting the opposition. And from that day onward, persecuted him, 70 00:07:47,830 --> 00:07:52,879 burned down his house, destroyed his farm and he fled for his life. So the legal 71 00:07:52,879 --> 00:08:05,199 test is the opinion or the perception of the persecutory. Now, I'd like to go to 72 00:08:05,199 --> 00:08:09,479 the social group category. This is really important, because this relates to some of 73 00:08:09,479 --> 00:08:14,590 my clients and in particular the Snowden refugees. And a social group is a 74 00:08:14,590 --> 00:08:19,330 particular group of people that are connected or linked through a shared 75 00:08:19,330 --> 00:08:26,059 characteristic or there's a perception by society that they, you know, having 76 00:08:26,059 --> 00:08:33,010 certain characteristics that they form a group. These characteristics are typically 77 00:08:33,010 --> 00:08:39,060 historical and relate fundamentally to an individual's identity and conscience. 78 00:08:39,060 --> 00:08:44,150 Usually they're unchangeable. And if they're not unchangeable, that person 79 00:08:44,150 --> 00:08:49,200 should not have to change those character characteristics, because they are 80 00:08:49,200 --> 00:08:54,700 fundamental to their identity or conscience. If they can be changed, they 81 00:08:54,700 --> 00:08:58,100 still should not be changed because they're linked to that person's 82 00:08:58,100 --> 00:09:03,400 fundamental exercise of human rights. The Snowden refugees fall into the social 83 00:09:03,400 --> 00:09:09,410 group category. Aside from having claims with Hong Kong and the Canadian government 84 00:09:09,410 --> 00:09:14,720 under political opinion for supporting helping Mr. Snowden, they form the unique 85 00:09:14,720 --> 00:09:19,080 social group that I think everyone in the world recognizes. They are the Snowden 86 00:09:19,080 --> 00:09:25,010 refugees and the social group are individuals that protect whistleblowers. 87 00:09:25,010 --> 00:09:35,520 That's the social category. *Applause* 88 00:09:35,520 --> 00:09:42,240 One thing I'll stress is that we hear about whistleblowers and public support 89 00:09:42,240 --> 00:09:47,530 for whistleblowers, not protection. Public support for journalists to carry out their 90 00:09:47,530 --> 00:09:55,120 duties. Quite often working or reporting, what whistleblowers want to disclose. But 91 00:09:55,120 --> 00:10:00,260 there is not enough in, in terms of legal applications, there's not enough in terms 92 00:10:00,260 --> 00:10:07,370 of public awareness, the importance of the average individual on the street, anybody 93 00:10:07,370 --> 00:10:11,500 on the street who may one day be faced with, what the Snowden refugees were faced 94 00:10:11,500 --> 00:10:18,370 with and make extraordinary decisions of conscience to help a whistleblower. I'm 95 00:10:18,370 --> 00:10:24,440 mentioning the CAT Convention, the United Nations Convention of Torture. Torture is 96 00:10:24,440 --> 00:10:29,420 a non-derogable right. It's not to be tortured is a non-derogable right. There 97 00:10:29,420 --> 00:10:35,800 is no circumstances that exist that can justify any state or private party 98 00:10:35,800 --> 00:10:42,660 torturing an individual. And I also mentioned the International Covenant on 99 00:10:42,660 --> 00:10:51,110 Civil and Political Rights and 3, 3 core rights here are the right to life and that 100 00:10:51,110 --> 00:10:59,270 it should not be arbitrarily taken. Tortures repeated here, but also cruel, 101 00:10:59,270 --> 00:11:02,960 inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. And this is a a non-derogable 102 00:11:02,960 --> 00:11:08,500 right. No one should ever be subjected to this. And then the last one I'm going to 103 00:11:08,500 --> 00:11:13,860 mention, I apologize, is liberty and security in particular, arbitrary arrest 104 00:11:13,860 --> 00:11:18,750 and arbitrary detention. And as we see globally today, countries around the world 105 00:11:18,750 --> 00:11:23,320 where there's mass protests against government corruption, government abuses, 106 00:11:23,320 --> 00:11:27,450 a lack of freedoms. Governments are arbitrarily using arbitrary arrest and 107 00:11:27,450 --> 00:11:37,650 detention to make people disappear. To shut them up. No need to mention or point 108 00:11:37,650 --> 00:11:44,280 to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And in there, as well as Article 109 00:11:44,280 --> 00:11:50,740 31 of the Refugee Convention, that every refugee claimant has an absolute right to 110 00:11:50,740 --> 00:11:57,600 cross a border if they're at risk of losing their liberty, their life or 111 00:11:57,600 --> 00:12:03,530 serious harm. And unfortunately, we're living in a world today where countries 112 00:12:03,530 --> 00:12:12,140 and around the world are putting up walls that are real, walls that are virtual. 113 00:12:12,140 --> 00:12:16,150 Because they do not want to address or comply with their international 114 00:12:16,150 --> 00:12:21,810 obligations to help the most vulnerable. And what nation states are doing is 115 00:12:21,810 --> 00:12:28,100 they're using propaganda, inaccurate information, false information to 116 00:12:28,100 --> 00:12:33,430 criminalize legitimate asylum seekers and refugees, to try to categorize them as 117 00:12:33,430 --> 00:12:43,880 illegal immigrants, economic migrants. And with all of this, we're seeing an erosion 118 00:12:43,880 --> 00:12:49,320 of international law and constitutional law. And one area where nations have been 119 00:12:49,320 --> 00:12:56,301 very clever is they've been using the strategy of constructive refoulement. Now 120 00:12:56,301 --> 00:13:04,610 refoulement means to return. And in Hong Kong, for example, the government achieves 121 00:13:04,610 --> 00:13:08,290 constructive refoulement, which basically means, they create an environment that 122 00:13:08,290 --> 00:13:12,880 makes it intolerable for an individual to remain in that jurisdiction. And that in 123 00:13:12,880 --> 00:13:16,880 the end, that person's mental and physical integrity is so compromised, they make a 124 00:13:16,880 --> 00:13:20,830 decision to return their home country to take a risk. So whether they're going to 125 00:13:20,830 --> 00:13:25,670 live or die or lose their liberty or not. So in Hong Kong, for example, the 126 00:13:25,670 --> 00:13:30,480 government does not provide full humanitarian assistance. They criminalize 127 00:13:30,480 --> 00:13:40,050 work. There's no education allowed for adults. And employment is prohibited so 128 00:13:40,050 --> 00:13:45,250 that there's no way for the individual to be making money or participating in a 129 00:13:45,250 --> 00:13:50,230 meaningful way in society. And in the end, that person becomes so compromised, they 130 00:13:50,230 --> 00:13:55,130 decide to leave. The governments create these circumstances to violate their 131 00:13:55,130 --> 00:14:01,180 constitutional rights, international equal rights, by making them leave, by making 132 00:14:01,180 --> 00:14:06,440 the circumstances intolerable. You're seeing a global trend of criminalization 133 00:14:06,440 --> 00:14:12,960 and ill treatment of asylum seekers. You've seen similar legislative and policy 134 00:14:12,960 --> 00:14:20,570 and propaganda frameworks in Austria, Denmark and Hungary. We've all seen the 135 00:14:20,570 --> 00:14:25,470 asylum seekers who've lost their lives crossing the Mediterranean. In the United 136 00:14:25,470 --> 00:14:31,470 States we've seen separation of children separated from families, a tactic used by 137 00:14:31,470 --> 00:14:37,250 the US government. The children held in detention centers, deprived of blankets, 138 00:14:37,250 --> 00:14:44,010 soap, toothpaste, a lack of monitoring and care for the welfare and health of these 139 00:14:44,010 --> 00:14:48,870 children. Some have died and more recently. And this is a tactic also used 140 00:14:48,870 --> 00:14:54,320 by the Hong Kong government, but in a different way. Asylum seekers who are 141 00:14:54,320 --> 00:14:58,680 outside the U.S. jurisdiction, the immigration officers put incorrect 142 00:14:58,680 --> 00:15:04,560 addresses recorded in the system, so that they cannot receive legal notifications 143 00:15:04,560 --> 00:15:10,430 from the U.S. government. You've seen the same thing in Hong Kong. I know firsthand. 144 00:15:10,430 --> 00:15:14,350 I've seen asylum seekers go to the immigration and removal assessment 145 00:15:14,350 --> 00:15:19,750 section, try to hand in a document stating that they're raising a claim as a 146 00:15:19,750 --> 00:15:24,820 protection claimant for refugee status or torture. And there are security guards at 147 00:15:24,820 --> 00:15:29,980 the door that basic that tell them go away. It's not acceptable. Not immigration 148 00:15:29,980 --> 00:15:37,880 officers. And if they do manage to submit raising their refugee asylum claims, I've 149 00:15:37,880 --> 00:15:41,310 I've had too many clients, who've been told you're not using the right words to 150 00:15:41,310 --> 00:15:44,730 raise a claim that you're afraid you're gonna die or you're afraid you're going to 151 00:15:44,730 --> 00:15:50,300 be hurt. So these are tactics that deny, what I would describe, the due process 152 00:15:50,300 --> 00:16:03,170 rights of these votes, this vulnerable groups. And I do want to mention Thailand 153 00:16:03,170 --> 00:16:06,980 in terms of the treatment of asylum seekers. And that they have found mass 154 00:16:06,980 --> 00:16:14,460 graves in Thailand has been complicit in human trafficking of the Rohingya. Now, 155 00:16:14,460 --> 00:16:21,381 there's a few quotes I'd like to to read, and this is from the former U.N. high 156 00:16:21,381 --> 00:16:27,890 commissioner for Human Rights. And it was right for us -not just to have remembered 157 00:16:27,890 --> 00:16:31,890 Mandela's greatness, but to have almost unconsciously contrasted it with all the 158 00:16:31,890 --> 00:16:36,260 narrow politicians, who continue to proliferate across the face of the world. 159 00:16:36,260 --> 00:16:41,360 Authoritarian in nature, many of them are wily political in-fighters, but most are 160 00:16:41,360 --> 00:16:47,130 of the thin mind and faint humanity, prone to fan division and intolerance. And just 161 00:16:47,130 --> 00:16:51,520 for the sake of securing their political ambition, while some do this more openly 162 00:16:51,520 --> 00:16:56,070 than others, all are well aware what they practice comes at the expense of 163 00:16:56,070 --> 00:17:04,650 vulnerable humans. And the U.N. high commissioner goes on to state to them, I 164 00:17:04,650 --> 00:17:08,660 say you may seize power or stubbornly hold onto it, by playing on and stoking the 165 00:17:08,660 --> 00:17:12,410 fears of your followers. You may congratulate yourselves for this and you 166 00:17:12,410 --> 00:17:16,799 may think yourself so clever for it. But we know all you've done is to copy the 167 00:17:16,799 --> 00:17:21,089 behavior of previous generations of once strong but ultimately catastrophic, 168 00:17:21,089 --> 00:17:25,529 leaders and politicians. Yours will, in the end, become a mouse like global 169 00:17:25,529 --> 00:17:29,639 reputation, never the fine example of the leader you think you are, and never even 170 00:17:29,639 --> 00:17:42,170 close to a Mandela. *Applause* 171 00:17:42,170 --> 00:17:45,879 To deserve global respect, you must begin to follow his example---committing to the 172 00:17:45,879 --> 00:17:51,029 spirit and letter of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Hong Kong 173 00:17:51,029 --> 00:17:54,630 does not recognize the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Hong Kong 174 00:17:54,630 --> 00:18:04,340 doesn't recognize the UN convention relating to the Status of Refugees. 175 00:18:04,340 --> 00:18:09,879 Michelle Bachelet, the current U.N. high commissioner, she stated early this year 176 00:18:09,879 --> 00:18:13,299 "the report outlines our efforts to assist States to uphold all human rights, at a 177 00:18:13,299 --> 00:18:18,970 time when humanity faces many serious challenges. These include the existential 178 00:18:18,970 --> 00:18:25,299 threat of climate change; technological developments: unbearable civilian 179 00:18:25,299 --> 00:18:28,460 suffering in multiple armed conflicts, displacement, youth unemployment, 180 00:18:28,460 --> 00:18:33,070 structural economic injustices, xenophobia and hate speech, and -- a focus on my 181 00:18:33,070 --> 00:18:43,940 statement today --- gross inequalities". Me specially continues focusing on these 182 00:18:43,940 --> 00:18:52,639 inequalities and I'm just going to read at the bottom. Yet in several cases they are 183 00:18:52,639 --> 00:18:56,260 being met with violent and excessive use of force, arbitrary detentions, torture, 184 00:18:56,260 --> 00:19:01,390 even alleged summary extrajudicial killings. People are protesting. People 185 00:19:01,390 --> 00:19:07,120 are protesting at the behavior of government and authoritarian leaders. And 186 00:19:07,120 --> 00:19:12,120 I put my mind to how to describe what's going on. And in the best way I've been 187 00:19:12,120 --> 00:19:17,110 able to describe it is, that these authoritarian leaders, democratic, 188 00:19:17,110 --> 00:19:29,980 elected, have become unhinged, disconnected from from the populace. And 189 00:19:29,980 --> 00:19:39,429 most recently, especially as talked about global protests, and she stated just a few 190 00:19:39,429 --> 00:19:43,080 months ago, I fear that we are moving farther away, further away from the global 191 00:19:43,080 --> 00:19:46,990 solutions to the global problems due to two clear trends that are taking us in the 192 00:19:46,990 --> 00:19:50,990 opposite directions. Today, in places with very different circumstances, level of 193 00:19:50,990 --> 00:19:54,450 development and political situations, we're seeing an outpouring of popular 194 00:19:54,450 --> 00:19:59,679 discontent and mass protests or their suppression with the firm hand of the 195 00:19:59,679 --> 00:20:07,529 state in every region. And Hong Kong is included in here and I'll just part move 196 00:20:07,529 --> 00:20:13,149 forward. We see the desperate need for dialog. The use of unnecessary and 197 00:20:13,149 --> 00:20:16,470 disproportionate force against people holding dissenting views 198 00:20:16,470 --> 00:20:19,529 and arrests of individuals exercising their rights to freedom of expression and 199 00:20:19,529 --> 00:20:25,119 peaceful assembly can only exacerbate tensions, seriously undermining the space 200 00:20:25,119 --> 00:20:37,570 for dialog. In my view, we are in crisis. There is a global crisis. What I thought I 201 00:20:37,570 --> 00:20:45,400 would do is to give some tangible examples through the casework I do. Narendra Modi. 202 00:20:45,400 --> 00:20:49,629 His platform has been Hindu nationalism, and that's been at the expense of 203 00:20:49,629 --> 00:20:55,060 religious minorities and ethnic minorities in India. In particular, the Muslim 204 00:20:55,060 --> 00:21:02,930 population. And what Modi has done and this is this is a thread that runs through 205 00:21:02,930 --> 00:21:06,519 what happens in other jurisdictions, including Hong Kong, is when you have 206 00:21:06,519 --> 00:21:11,840 nationalism and minorities are targeted by the government or they're discriminated 207 00:21:11,840 --> 00:21:18,750 against. Third parties in the private sector or related to politicians act on 208 00:21:18,750 --> 00:21:23,570 their own. And when the state allows that to happen, we call that state 209 00:21:23,570 --> 00:21:33,559 acquiescence. And in India, that's what we're seeing. Back here. Recently, there 210 00:21:33,559 --> 00:21:42,320 was a deprivation of citizenship of 1.9 million people in Assam state, an 211 00:21:42,320 --> 00:21:48,049 arbitrary act by Modi's government. And as of last week, there was a new bill enacted 212 00:21:48,049 --> 00:21:52,409 into law, granting citizenship to Hindus, Buddhists and Christians from certain 213 00:21:52,409 --> 00:21:59,549 Southeast Asian countries. But it excludes Muslims and it also excludes the Sri 214 00:21:59,549 --> 00:22:07,149 Lankan Tamils, for which there is a huge number of refugees, who had fled from Sri 215 00:22:07,149 --> 00:22:16,159 Lanka. And what Modi has done is all contrary to Article 15 up to 28, and 216 00:22:16,159 --> 00:22:19,710 that's prohibition of discrimination based on religion, race and 217 00:22:19,710 --> 00:22:25,269 place of birth. The tactics used by governments today in doing what Modi has 218 00:22:25,269 --> 00:22:33,230 done, it's being used all over the world. The executive branch for the legislator 219 00:22:33,230 --> 00:22:37,820 legislature passes legislation that's unconstitutional and it may take a year or 220 00:22:37,820 --> 00:22:44,191 two or three years before a court strikes it down. But during that gap period, those 221 00:22:44,191 --> 00:22:49,900 people who are discriminated against or persecuted suffer. Often they have to flee 222 00:22:49,900 --> 00:22:55,229 their homes. They had to flee their country or they're hurt or they're killed. 223 00:22:55,229 --> 00:23:01,639 So this is another way that democratically elected leaders are utilizing the 224 00:23:01,639 --> 00:23:05,519 government and the legal system to strip away constitutional rights and rights 225 00:23:05,519 --> 00:23:14,139 under international law. Sri Lanka, extraordinarily good by Rajapaksa, accused 226 00:23:14,139 --> 00:23:18,080 of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, was elected as Sri Lanka's new 227 00:23:18,080 --> 00:23:26,850 president just a month ago. In 1987 to 1988, 1990, he was the commanding officer 228 00:23:26,850 --> 00:23:33,650 in charge of the Mottola district, where about eight years ago they found mass 229 00:23:33,650 --> 00:23:39,539 graves. In 2009, he was accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity and 230 00:23:39,539 --> 00:23:44,570 genocide. At the end of the war bombing, hospitals, civilian hospitals where they 231 00:23:44,570 --> 00:23:52,869 were Tamils, actually judicial killings, summary executions. And the 232 00:23:52,869 --> 00:24:05,389 platform of Rutter Rajapaksa was based on ethnicity and nationalism. And the 233 00:24:05,389 --> 00:24:14,460 Philippines. Duterte came to power in 2016. It was on the platform that he would 234 00:24:14,460 --> 00:24:19,760 carry out mass extrajudicial killings against drug addicts and drug traffickers. 235 00:24:19,760 --> 00:24:25,580 He had done that when he was mayor of Davao City in southern Philippines. And in 236 00:24:25,580 --> 00:24:31,190 June 2016, when he took power as president of the country, he did exactly that to 237 00:24:31,190 --> 00:24:37,489 over 20.000 Philipinos executed. The president, the Philippines, the government 238 00:24:37,489 --> 00:24:43,759 have threatened NGO, human rights activists, ethnic minorities, Catholic 239 00:24:43,759 --> 00:24:50,720 Church and even U.N. special rapporteurs. And stunningly Duterte was actually 240 00:24:50,720 --> 00:24:58,450 filmed. This was televised, where he in his campaign and basically committing 241 00:24:58,450 --> 00:25:02,980 crimes against humanity. He said "If Germany had Hitler, the Philippines would 242 00:25:02,980 --> 00:25:08,960 have. He said, pausing and pointing to himself. Hitler massacred three million 243 00:25:08,960 --> 00:25:18,090 Jews. There's three million drug addicts, there are. I'd be happy to slaughter them. 244 00:25:18,090 --> 00:25:28,720 And a year later, Donald Trump congratulated Duterte on his war on drugs. 245 00:25:28,720 --> 00:25:34,039 U.N. Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous people, Victoria Tauli-Corpuz. 246 00:25:34,039 --> 00:25:37,739 She fled the jurisdiction because the tar tape put her on a her name on a terrorist 247 00:25:37,739 --> 00:25:46,119 list. This is about state acquiescence to human rights violations when a government 248 00:25:46,119 --> 00:25:52,191 puts an individual's name on a list. And what happened in the Philippines? Private 249 00:25:52,191 --> 00:25:55,840 parties took the law into their own hands and executed a number of people, 250 00:25:55,840 --> 00:25:59,941 assassinated them. So that was the fear for the UN special rapporteur, and she 251 00:25:59,941 --> 00:26:07,110 fled the jurisdiction. Complaints were filed with the International Criminal 252 00:26:07,110 --> 00:26:17,489 Court for crimes against humanity against Duterte. And also this UN special 253 00:26:17,489 --> 00:26:25,379 rapporteur, Agnes Kellerman on summary and extradition killings. Both the 254 00:26:25,379 --> 00:26:29,009 International Criminal Court prosecutor was threatened by Duterte and also the UN 255 00:26:29,009 --> 00:26:36,659 Special Rapporteur. Most significantly, the ICC prosecutor was threatened with 256 00:26:36,659 --> 00:26:41,280 arrest, if she came to the Philippines to investigate. She'd be assaulted and she'd 257 00:26:41,280 --> 00:26:48,799 be killed. She'd be fed to the crocodiles. Philippines officially withdrew from the 258 00:26:48,799 --> 00:26:58,099 International Criminal Court, but that still does not protect President Duterte. 259 00:26:58,099 --> 00:27:02,689 Duterte may have committed possible war crimes. I've mentioned a few here, 260 00:27:02,689 --> 00:27:10,850 particularly calling for horrific crimes to be committed against women. And the 261 00:27:10,850 --> 00:27:15,031 People's Republic of China has been a great supporter of Duterte today, and it's 262 00:27:15,031 --> 00:27:19,259 understood that, because of the provisions under the Rome Statute for the 263 00:27:19,259 --> 00:27:25,149 International Criminal Court, that Duterte would not be prosecuted. China would use 264 00:27:25,149 --> 00:27:29,580 its veto power in the International Criminal Court to prevent any prosecution 265 00:27:29,580 --> 00:27:38,759 of him. Again, this is an example of how states are interfering with violating or 266 00:27:38,759 --> 00:27:48,229 making international law useless. The People's Republic of China, the most 267 00:27:48,229 --> 00:27:52,489 pressing example are the current concentration or detention camps in China. 268 00:27:52,489 --> 00:27:59,010 Of the Uighur Muslims, and despite the China cable, satellite images and 269 00:27:59,010 --> 00:28:04,700 witnesses, China denies that they've arbitrarily arrested, arbitrarily detained 270 00:28:04,700 --> 00:28:13,910 and disappeared over a million from [unaudible] Xinjiang provice. 271 00:28:13,910 --> 00:28:19,679 I'd like to mention Hong Kong very briefly, and Hong Kong has had a 272 00:28:19,679 --> 00:28:26,960 history of violating its own constitution and international law. From the Sami al- 273 00:28:26,960 --> 00:28:32,149 Saadi extraordinary rendition, where Hong Kong deprived Mr. Saudi of all his due 274 00:28:32,149 --> 00:28:36,509 process rights and its protections under international law and handed him over the 275 00:28:36,509 --> 00:28:43,130 UK and U.S. government on a rendition flight in 2004. And that was the incident 276 00:28:43,130 --> 00:28:48,369 that put fear that made, that gave me great concern when Mr. Snowden was in Hong 277 00:28:48,369 --> 00:28:53,590 Kong, that the Hong Kong government could not be trusted to uphold its constitution, 278 00:28:53,590 --> 00:29:05,489 to uphold international law. 2014 Occupy protests, Ken Tsang, a politician. He was 279 00:29:05,489 --> 00:29:10,700 hold tied, hands tied behind his back and his legs and tortured by the police, and 280 00:29:10,700 --> 00:29:18,410 it was caught on video and these officers were convicted, but then they compared 281 00:29:18,410 --> 00:29:23,220 them, the police compared themselves to being persecuted as the Jewish people had 282 00:29:23,220 --> 00:29:33,489 during the Holocaust. And that's on video that's been publicly recorded. And 2018 283 00:29:33,489 --> 00:29:38,649 Allen Lee and Ray Wong fled Hong Kong in fear for their liberty and their and their 284 00:29:38,649 --> 00:29:43,859 safety, and they were granted refugee status by the German government, which was 285 00:29:43,859 --> 00:29:48,759 the right thing to do. And this caused a lot of outrage of the Hong Kong government 286 00:29:48,759 --> 00:29:54,710 and Beijing. And right now we have the Hong Kong protests, including arbitrary 287 00:29:54,710 --> 00:29:58,280 arrest, arbitrary detention, cruel and inhuman or degrading treatment and 288 00:29:58,280 --> 00:30:03,279 punishment, torture, enforced disappearances, cases of rape by the 289 00:30:03,279 --> 00:30:16,539 police and actual extrajudicial killings. I'm going to skip this. I still have 290 00:30:16,539 --> 00:30:21,369 clients, my clients in Hong Kong, Snowden refugees, and fortunately this March, 291 00:30:21,369 --> 00:30:27,710 March of this year, Vanessa O'Dell and her daughter Keana safely arrived in Canada, 292 00:30:27,710 --> 00:30:40,349 having been granted refugee status. *Applause* 293 00:30:40,349 --> 00:30:47,330 This was a seven and a half year battle, seven and a half years, and one thing I'll 294 00:30:47,330 --> 00:30:54,959 say is that so many people gave up, so many people said to me, you're not going 295 00:30:54,959 --> 00:31:01,889 to win. It's taken too long. What? Why don't you just move on with other cases? 296 00:31:01,889 --> 00:31:07,779 Anyways, I believed that we'd be successful. And we have. 297 00:31:07,779 --> 00:31:26,649 *Applause* Keana, in this photo, this is Keana on her 298 00:31:26,649 --> 00:31:33,740 father's lap. And her father is still in Hong Kong with her brother and sister. 299 00:31:33,740 --> 00:31:43,259 Satyam de and Denath, and we would like to see this family being reunited in Canada 300 00:31:43,259 --> 00:31:54,809 and we're asking Canada to act fast, as fast as possible. She has a sister who 301 00:31:54,809 --> 00:32:00,840 only thinks about in Hong Kong something, who only thinks about being reunited with 302 00:32:00,840 --> 00:32:06,460 Keana in Montreal. And at this time, with the with the police abuses, the government 303 00:32:06,460 --> 00:32:12,190 abuses in Hong Kong Sethumdi she has been traumatized and she suffered permanent 304 00:32:12,190 --> 00:32:17,129 damage. The whole family is afraid. They live in fear and they are at heightened 305 00:32:17,129 --> 00:32:24,779 risk with the lawlessness in Hong Kong. The lawlessness by the Hong Kong police. I 306 00:32:24,779 --> 00:32:29,320 just want to share this picture, which was taken by Jane Russell in August this year. 307 00:32:29,320 --> 00:32:34,250 This is the Hong Kong Police Tactical Unit in Fanling. And you'll notice that there's 308 00:32:34,250 --> 00:32:43,409 no Hong Kong flag. And Jane Russell, photojournalist, pointed this out. And it 309 00:32:43,409 --> 00:32:48,809 was at that point we all realized that the hand of Beijing was apparently acting 310 00:32:48,809 --> 00:33:03,679 directly inside Hong Kong. Directing the Hong Kong police. What's happened in Hong 311 00:33:03,679 --> 00:33:12,329 Kong, is the same thing that you see in Sri Lanka, in Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, 312 00:33:12,329 --> 00:33:18,539 where the government allows the police to commit abuses state sanctioned or the 313 00:33:18,539 --> 00:33:22,629 police commit abuses and the government turns a blind eye. And that amounts to 314 00:33:22,629 --> 00:33:27,249 state acquiescence. And what's happened in Hong Kong is, what you see classically in 315 00:33:27,249 --> 00:33:32,669 Sri Lanka or the Philippines, where third private parties take the law into their 316 00:33:32,669 --> 00:33:39,759 own hands and go after innocent civilians or peaceful protesters. Hong Kong has 317 00:33:39,759 --> 00:33:46,119 become a very dangerous place today. And my clients lives are at risk, at a 318 00:33:46,119 --> 00:33:56,720 heightened risk. I thought I would share this image taken by Keana's father of 319 00:33:56,720 --> 00:34:03,789 [inaudible] during the protests. And this is what these children are 320 00:34:03,789 --> 00:34:13,990 growing up in this kind of environment right now. Where really where they should 321 00:34:13,990 --> 00:34:24,330 be, is in this environment. And this is Vanessa and Keana in Montreal, Quebec, not 322 00:34:24,330 --> 00:34:33,130 just earlier this month. Now, what I'd like to do in saying that is I'd like to 323 00:34:33,130 --> 00:35:26,070 invite Mr. Snowden to join us. Dom. Check. Edward Snowden: Can anyone hear me? Thank 324 00:35:26,070 --> 00:35:27,070 you. *Applause* 325 00:35:27,070 --> 00:35:33,250 We have very little time. So let me first give thanks to Robert Tibbo. I know it's 326 00:35:33,250 --> 00:35:40,920 not always fun for Rudy to sit through, what is effectively a long lecture about 327 00:35:40,920 --> 00:35:45,180 what's wrong with the world. But these things matter and it's important that we 328 00:35:45,180 --> 00:35:51,940 remember how they get better. I've been thinking a lot this year and writing my 329 00:35:51,940 --> 00:35:58,390 book, Permanent Record and after about the state of the world and the direction of 330 00:35:58,390 --> 00:36:01,480 our future. *laughing* 331 00:36:01,480 --> 00:36:06,490 I trust that each of you will understand that in 2019 this was not an especially 332 00:36:06,490 --> 00:36:12,650 enjoyable activity, but it's necessary. And one of the bright spots for me in this 333 00:36:12,650 --> 00:36:20,990 increasingly dark world has been the fact that people like you, that CCC has 334 00:36:20,990 --> 00:36:27,020 supported these families over the last few years. They made a difference for me. 335 00:36:27,020 --> 00:36:29,830 Think think about, what would have happened if I wouldn't have been able to 336 00:36:29,830 --> 00:36:33,520 get off the street. Think about what might have happened to me. I think about the 337 00:36:33,520 --> 00:36:37,040 fact that I wouldn't be able to talk to you today and all these years since the 338 00:36:37,040 --> 00:36:44,840 book that I wrote would not exist. It might seem like a small thing, you know, 339 00:36:44,840 --> 00:36:49,130 to you, to it to give a donation to help out. But I believe that it really has 340 00:36:49,130 --> 00:36:56,260 genuinely changed the future of these brave families in a positive way. And so 341 00:36:56,260 --> 00:37:01,210 when I'm thinking about everything that's broken in the world. It got me thinking 342 00:37:01,210 --> 00:37:05,800 about the lessons that can be taken from them and how they fit into a larger 343 00:37:05,800 --> 00:37:11,870 framework. We have pretty limited time here. So I'm going to do something a 344 00:37:11,870 --> 00:37:20,741 little bit unusual to try to summarize and read a little passage from the book. What 345 00:37:20,741 --> 00:37:28,390 makes a life? It's more than what we say. More even than what we do. A life is also 346 00:37:28,390 --> 00:37:34,880 about what we love and what we believe in. For me, what I love and believe in the 347 00:37:34,880 --> 00:37:41,020 most is connection, human connection and the technologies by which that's achieved. 348 00:37:41,020 --> 00:37:44,480 Those technologies include books, of course. But for my generation, connection 349 00:37:44,480 --> 00:37:50,120 has largely met the Internet. Now, before a lot of you recoil, knowing how broken 350 00:37:50,120 --> 00:37:54,560 the Internet, the toxic madness that's all over it. I understand that for me, as it 351 00:37:54,560 --> 00:37:58,600 was for, I believe many of you, when I came to know it. The Internet was a very 352 00:37:58,600 --> 00:38:03,360 different thing. It was a friend and a parent. It was a community without borders 353 00:38:03,360 --> 00:38:09,440 or limit. One voice and millions, a common frontier that had been settled, but not 354 00:38:09,440 --> 00:38:15,130 exploited by diverse tribes living amicably enough side by side. Each member 355 00:38:15,130 --> 00:38:22,710 which was free to choose their own name and history and culture. Everyone wore 356 00:38:22,710 --> 00:38:29,700 masks. And yet this culture of anonymity through polyanomy produced more truth and 357 00:38:29,700 --> 00:38:34,770 falsehood, because it was creative and cooperative rather than commercial and 358 00:38:34,770 --> 00:38:40,930 competitive. Certainly there was conflict, but it was outweighed by goodwill and good 359 00:38:40,930 --> 00:38:47,241 feelings. The true pioneering spirit. You'll understand why I say, that the 360 00:38:47,241 --> 00:38:51,850 internet today is in many ways unrecognizable. It's worth noting that 361 00:38:51,850 --> 00:38:58,060 this change has been a conscious choice, the result of a systematic effort on the 362 00:38:58,060 --> 00:39:05,550 part of a privileged few. The early rush to turn commerce into e-commerce quickly 363 00:39:05,550 --> 00:39:11,670 led to a bubble and then, just after the term of the millennium, to a collapse. 364 00:39:11,670 --> 00:39:15,070 After that, companies realized that people who went online were far less interested 365 00:39:15,070 --> 00:39:22,490 in spending than in sharing, and that the human connection, the internet made possible, 366 00:39:22,490 --> 00:39:28,800 could be monetized. If most of what people wanted to do online, was to be able to 367 00:39:28,800 --> 00:39:33,700 tell their family and their friends and strangers what they were up to and to be 368 00:39:33,700 --> 00:39:38,060 told what their family, friends and strangers were up to in return, then all 369 00:39:38,060 --> 00:39:41,930 companies had to do to figure out how to put them was figure out how to put 370 00:39:41,930 --> 00:39:47,551 themselves in the middle of those social exchanges and turn them into profit. This 371 00:39:47,551 --> 00:39:54,600 was the beginning of surveying capitalism and the end of the Internet, as I know it 372 00:39:54,600 --> 00:40:00,210 now. It was the creative web that collapsed as countless beautiful, 373 00:40:00,210 --> 00:40:05,630 difficult, individualized web sites were shuttered. The promise of convenience led 374 00:40:05,630 --> 00:40:09,520 people to exchange their personal sites, which demanded constant and laborious 375 00:40:09,520 --> 00:40:15,100 upkeep. As you are known for a Facebook page and a Gmail account, the appearance 376 00:40:15,100 --> 00:40:22,860 of ownership was easy to mistake for the reality of it. But few of us understood it 377 00:40:22,860 --> 00:40:31,030 at the time. None of the things that we go on to share would belong to us anymore. 378 00:40:31,030 --> 00:40:35,100 The successors to the emerge commerce companies that had failed because they 379 00:40:35,100 --> 00:40:43,500 couldn't find anything to sell, that we were interested in. They now had a new 380 00:40:43,500 --> 00:40:50,300 product to sell, and that product was us, our attention, our activities, our 381 00:40:50,300 --> 00:40:54,860 locations, our desires, everything about us, that we revealed knowingly or 382 00:40:54,860 --> 00:41:00,530 unknowingly, with or without consent, was being surveilled and sold in secret so as 383 00:41:00,530 --> 00:41:06,980 to delay the inevitable feeling violation that is for most of us arriving now. And 384 00:41:06,980 --> 00:41:11,450 this surveillance would go on to be actively encouraged and even funded by an 385 00:41:11,450 --> 00:41:15,410 army of governments greedy for the vast volume of intelligence that they would 386 00:41:15,410 --> 00:41:20,891 gain from these practices. Aside from logins and financial transactions, hardly any 387 00:41:20,891 --> 00:41:25,580 communications were encrypted in the early twenty aughts, which meant that in many 388 00:41:25,580 --> 00:41:30,960 cases governments didn't need to even bother approaching the companies that were 389 00:41:30,960 --> 00:41:36,520 running these platforms in order to know what their customers were doing. They 390 00:41:36,520 --> 00:41:46,800 could just spy on the world without telling a soul. And now I ask you, is this 391 00:41:46,800 --> 00:41:53,661 what the world should look like and how did this come to be? We were there. We 392 00:41:53,661 --> 00:42:00,130 were watching, and we thought we controlled the system. We thought we ran 393 00:42:00,130 --> 00:42:07,010 the system. We thought it was our Internet. But here we are. Surveillance, 394 00:42:07,010 --> 00:42:13,350 after all, is less about safety than it is about control. And when you look around at 395 00:42:13,350 --> 00:42:18,520 the union of technical and political systems today, it seems that they intend 396 00:42:18,520 --> 00:42:26,790 less to serve us than for us to serve them. And it's funny talking about this at 397 00:42:26,790 --> 00:42:36,180 CCC, because to me it it feels like a hack. You know what is hacking, I'm sure, 398 00:42:36,180 --> 00:42:42,390 all you guys have different definitions. But in my definition, it's not just 399 00:42:42,390 --> 00:42:49,570 programing. Of course, we wouldn't see terms like bio hacking. Hacking is about 400 00:42:49,570 --> 00:42:56,600 rules and the distance between how they are believed to operate and how they 401 00:42:56,600 --> 00:43:03,230 operate in fact. Hacking for me means, coming to understand a system better than 402 00:43:03,230 --> 00:43:10,960 its creators or its operators and using that understanding to produce impossible 403 00:43:10,960 --> 00:43:19,530 results, unexpected behavior. Thanks so much. Now we'd like to think about hacks 404 00:43:19,530 --> 00:43:25,560 in a positive light, but in the case of these last few decades, it's our society 405 00:43:25,560 --> 00:43:30,160 that was hacked. It is the whole of our network. It is the Internet itself, that 406 00:43:30,160 --> 00:43:38,010 they exploit. And you see that. That's the thing. The choices that we make and the 407 00:43:38,010 --> 00:43:47,850 things that you do. They have power and doing nothing, that that's a choice. Now, 408 00:43:47,850 --> 00:43:53,740 a lot of us like to think it's a willing choice. We'd like to think that we're the 409 00:43:53,740 --> 00:43:58,031 sole captains of our own destiny. And that's the way it's supposed to be. That's 410 00:43:58,031 --> 00:44:03,120 the way it was intended. That's the way we designed the system. And yet the system 411 00:44:03,120 --> 00:44:09,260 today. Somehow the actors within it spend an enormous amount of energy trying to 412 00:44:09,260 --> 00:44:14,680 make you forget, that the things you do affect the outcome. They'll tell you not 413 00:44:14,680 --> 00:44:19,780 to worry about it. That that it's not so bad after all. You know, it could be 414 00:44:19,780 --> 00:44:28,010 worse. But I say to you, it could be better. And every time we hear those 415 00:44:28,010 --> 00:44:34,310 words, that's what we need to say. Every system in history, even the most powerful, 416 00:44:34,310 --> 00:44:42,830 has been subject to change. And every hack that is performed against us, can face a 417 00:44:42,830 --> 00:44:50,880 patch and more in all of the trouble to which these people have gone, to to make 418 00:44:50,880 --> 00:44:55,910 the people broadly forget their own power, they have forgotten something that I think 419 00:44:55,910 --> 00:45:06,010 is fundamental. We can hack back. They run the system. They may have won today. But 420 00:45:06,010 --> 00:45:09,340 I've been thinking about this, look, we all know the history and it has been a 421 00:45:09,340 --> 00:45:17,020 dark time. But I'm here today in front of you to say that tomorrow will be ours. 422 00:45:17,020 --> 00:45:22,880 Change is coming and it is coming from people who pay attention. People who care. 423 00:45:22,880 --> 00:45:28,040 It will come from people like you, who took the time out of the day, out of their 424 00:45:28,040 --> 00:45:32,490 lives. The money out of their pocket to travel. The time, the minutes of your life 425 00:45:32,490 --> 00:45:42,140 to be here today, standing in solidarity, talking, learning, sharing to show that 426 00:45:42,140 --> 00:45:51,070 this broken world could very well be better. We can change it. We can change 427 00:45:51,070 --> 00:45:57,910 everything. One system, one rule at a time. Thank you. 428 00:45:57,910 --> 00:46:31,130 *Applause* I just hope it's not kind of I no longer 429 00:46:31,130 --> 00:46:33,770 have audio, so I'm afraid I won't be able to. 430 00:46:33,770 --> 00:46:37,560 Robert Tibbo: Ed, we've got Vanessa on the screen, half the screen with you right 431 00:46:37,560 --> 00:46:44,560 now. And she's, uh, she's on video live from Montreal. And can you... 432 00:46:44,560 --> 00:46:51,330 ES: Just if it's not clear I can't do anything even so, I'm a bystander now. I'm 433 00:46:51,330 --> 00:47:00,710 going to go to the stream and hopefully Robert and Vanessa can help us for the Q&A 434 00:47:00,710 --> 00:47:09,640 RT: Ed, do you want to do a Q&A right now or do you want to. They've lost that. All 435 00:47:09,640 --> 00:47:19,650 right, so, yeah. So Vanessa's in Montreal and I've invited here her here today. And 436 00:47:19,650 --> 00:47:26,610 so why don't we just start with a Q and A? This is this is really it's Vanessa's 437 00:47:26,610 --> 00:47:32,940 first year after a decade and a half of being under very difficult circumstances. 438 00:47:32,940 --> 00:47:45,280 *Applause* Herald: Also, you know the drill. We have 439 00:47:45,280 --> 00:47:49,330 microphones in the halls. Please line up behind them. If you have question for a 440 00:47:49,330 --> 00:47:56,830 Robert Tibbo or Vanessa and hopefully Mr. Snowden will join us again, I think we're 441 00:47:56,830 --> 00:48:04,900 working out the background. Do we have questions from the Internet so far? Yes, 442 00:48:04,900 --> 00:48:08,900 that is the case. So, Signal-Engel, please give us a question. 443 00:48:08,900 --> 00:48:12,220 Signal-Angel: Do you think that whistleblowing could have prevented 444 00:48:12,220 --> 00:48:17,280 fascist received regimes in the past and that it will be more important in the near 445 00:48:17,280 --> 00:48:26,970 future for the same reason? RT: Questions for me, I'm assuming. 446 00:48:26,970 --> 00:48:34,740 Whistleblowing has always occurred in the past and it has brought about change. 447 00:48:34,740 --> 00:48:40,400 Historically there, you know, there are recorded cases, but the difficulties in 448 00:48:40,400 --> 00:48:45,710 the past were the lack of protections. Quite often in whistleblowers had to leave 449 00:48:45,710 --> 00:48:52,780 the jurisdiction. They would end up being killed. And and really, it's only in 450 00:48:52,780 --> 00:48:59,520 recent history and in particular with with Edward Snowden's whistleblowing, that 451 00:48:59,520 --> 00:49:05,690 governments around the world, including the European Union as a whole, recognize 452 00:49:05,690 --> 00:49:12,280 that there needs to be change. There needs to be more protections. But we're also 453 00:49:12,280 --> 00:49:17,620 seeing that nations are providing enhanced whistleblower protections. But on the 454 00:49:17,620 --> 00:49:23,230 commercial civil side and they're still lagging significantly, where there's 455 00:49:23,230 --> 00:49:28,630 whistleblowing outing governments that behave egregiously or criminally, as in 456 00:49:28,630 --> 00:49:36,620 Mr. Snowden's case. So more than ever, whistleblowing will remain and will 457 00:49:36,620 --> 00:49:41,860 continue to be a crucial part of ensuring government accountability and 458 00:49:41,860 --> 00:49:47,270 transparency. But for whistleblowers to step forward, a couple of things have to 459 00:49:47,270 --> 00:49:52,880 happen. Society needs to be stepping up and demanding government that there be 460 00:49:52,880 --> 00:49:59,280 protections for whistleblowers, particularly like Mr. Snowden. And 461 00:49:59,280 --> 00:50:08,320 secondly, we've seen the government go after with the Snowden refugees and made 462 00:50:08,320 --> 00:50:16,510 their lives intolerable. There exists in existence intolerable in Hong Kong and the 463 00:50:16,510 --> 00:50:22,950 delay of so many years to get Vanessa and Keana on the screen now into Canada and 464 00:50:22,950 --> 00:50:28,750 the other families here in Hong Kong, who are suffering right now, was the the 465 00:50:28,750 --> 00:50:36,330 global leadership saying, don't protect a whistleblower, because this is what's 466 00:50:36,330 --> 00:50:44,070 gonna happen to you. So I hope that Vanessa and Keana's arrivaled refuge in 467 00:50:44,070 --> 00:50:49,580 Canada to safety and security, is an example for the whole world that there 468 00:50:49,580 --> 00:50:53,650 will be more whistleblowers. But there also needs to be people in the general 469 00:50:53,650 --> 00:50:59,480 population who say, look, we need to support them and to take steps to make 470 00:50:59,480 --> 00:51:03,430 whistle, make sure whistleblowers can remain safe, but also when democratic 471 00:51:03,430 --> 00:51:09,200 systems to put pressure on government, to make changes and whistleblower 472 00:51:09,200 --> 00:51:12,440 protections. Signal-Angel: Thank you a lot for the 473 00:51:12,440 --> 00:51:16,330 detailed answer. We have some more questions. But before we continue with 474 00:51:16,330 --> 00:51:21,270 them, I would like to ask all of you to stay seated and stay quiet. Some people 475 00:51:21,270 --> 00:51:25,820 are leaving already the hall. Please don't. And please stay quiet so we can 476 00:51:25,820 --> 00:51:31,510 enjoy the last minutes of this lovely Q and A. You can also ask questions to 477 00:51:31,510 --> 00:51:37,810 Vanessa, who played a crucial role in sheltering Mr. Snowden back in Hong Kong. 478 00:51:37,810 --> 00:51:43,220 And for now, I would like to hear a question from microphone number three. 479 00:51:43,220 --> 00:51:49,440 Mic 3: Hi. I'm [inaudible] Hi, I'm a Pakistani journalist in exile. So thank you for the 480 00:51:49,440 --> 00:51:57,200 talk. It's been super inspiring. My question to Vanessa is that looking back 481 00:51:57,200 --> 00:52:02,520 now that you everything that you suffer. Would you say that if you were given a 482 00:52:02,520 --> 00:52:08,300 choice, that you could do this all over again and not do this at all? Would you? 483 00:52:08,300 --> 00:52:49,890 Which one would you choose? Vanessa: If I had the chance again [inaudible] 484 00:52:49,890 --> 00:53:01,990 *Applause* Herald: Can we have another question from 485 00:53:01,990 --> 00:53:07,230 the Internet? Signal-Angel: It's a question for Vanessa. 486 00:53:07,230 --> 00:53:35,920 How are you settling down in Montreal and has the community received you well? 487 00:53:35,920 --> 00:54:14,760 Vanessa: *inaudible* Herald: Thank you for this answer. Do we 488 00:54:14,760 --> 00:54:19,430 have more questions in the hall? I sat at a microphone and I can't see you right 489 00:54:19,430 --> 00:54:26,210 now. Please wink if you do. I think that's not the case. Signal-Angel. Do we have one 490 00:54:26,210 --> 00:54:31,500 more question from you? Or wait? Microphone number two, please go ahead. 491 00:54:31,500 --> 00:54:36,290 Mic. 2: I don't know which one of you can answer that, but what's causing the delay? 492 00:54:36,290 --> 00:54:40,391 Why is the families still separated? Is there any indication why Canada doesn't 493 00:54:40,391 --> 00:54:45,160 process the search for asylum? RT: *To an Angel: I want to put this on 494 00:54:45,160 --> 00:54:55,620 last. OK? RT: The Snowden refugee cases, it has been 495 00:54:55,620 --> 00:55:05,450 a long delay and it's been too long. And at this stage, the Canadian government is 496 00:55:05,450 --> 00:55:14,830 is progressing with the cases and these are complex cases. At this stage, that's 497 00:55:14,830 --> 00:55:21,180 all I can really say. We all want the other families supporting the DEKA, the 498 00:55:21,180 --> 00:55:25,070 two children, Kiena's brother and sister. And we want to treat this, the former 499 00:55:25,070 --> 00:55:30,760 soldier, and we want them in Canada. We want them in at the earliest time. And 500 00:55:30,760 --> 00:55:34,730 this is really the only solution. It's the right solution for the these extraordinary 501 00:55:34,730 --> 00:55:37,620 people. *Applaus* Mic 2: Thank You. 502 00:55:37,620 --> 00:55:46,920 *Applause* So apparently we have Edward Snowden 503 00:55:46,920 --> 00:55:51,030 back.The connection is established again. There is a question for him, then he's run 504 00:55:51,030 --> 00:55:54,960 to a microphone because that's your only chance. That's probably the last question 505 00:55:54,960 --> 00:55:59,930 of this session. Microphone number four, what's your question? Qualified? 506 00:55:59,930 --> 00:56:05,690 Mic. 4: Yes, I think so. What an aura. Thought. Thank you, everybody. My question 507 00:56:05,690 --> 00:56:14,610 quick. So, Mr. Snowden, you said we should put pressure and make change. And do you 508 00:56:14,610 --> 00:56:20,890 think we should pressure our own government locally or that we pressure our 509 00:56:20,890 --> 00:56:26,330 government to pressure other governments? So, for example, which sanctions through 510 00:56:26,330 --> 00:56:30,650 these countries that Mr. Tibbo mentioned? That's a quick. 511 00:56:30,650 --> 00:56:40,550 ES: Yes. I think we need to look at where can we be the most effective. This is a 512 00:56:40,550 --> 00:56:44,400 difficult question, I think, for people who are in advanced democracies. And 513 00:56:44,400 --> 00:56:47,360 because you see all the terrible things that are happening all over the world, you 514 00:56:47,360 --> 00:56:50,710 see the situation in Russia, you see the situation in China, you see the Russia 515 00:56:50,710 --> 00:56:55,570 situation in Iran and North Korea. And of course, where you can make a difference, I 516 00:56:55,570 --> 00:57:02,400 think you always should act. Even in my case, there have been things where I have 517 00:57:02,400 --> 00:57:06,660 been criticizing, of course, the Russian government, even though I live here, even 518 00:57:06,660 --> 00:57:11,800 though it's dangerous to do. I don't think there's much likelihood that the Russian 519 00:57:11,800 --> 00:57:16,530 government is likely to listen to me. I don't think there's much likelihood that 520 00:57:16,530 --> 00:57:22,610 the Russian people will listen to me in that circumstance, because I'm not 521 00:57:22,610 --> 00:57:30,020 Russian. I don't speak the language. I can't persuade them. But you can persuade 522 00:57:30,020 --> 00:57:34,540 the people that you're around. You can persuade the community. And that's really 523 00:57:34,540 --> 00:57:38,480 when we talk about hacking, when we talk about systems. Right. The whole thing that 524 00:57:38,480 --> 00:57:45,010 they used against us was, that they thought, we thought, you know, the system, 525 00:57:45,010 --> 00:57:50,870 our democracy, our methods of voting, our methods of policing the Internet, of 526 00:57:50,870 --> 00:57:58,100 managing and sharing our communications worked in a certain way. And how they were 527 00:57:58,100 --> 00:58:01,110 actually being used, how they were actually being implemented, how they were 528 00:58:01,110 --> 00:58:07,480 actually being operated in many cases against us. That was not clear in secrecy. 529 00:58:07,480 --> 00:58:13,880 In many cases was responsible for this. But when you talk about where you can make 530 00:58:13,880 --> 00:58:19,300 the most difference, it's in this room. It's the friendships you make that you 531 00:58:19,300 --> 00:58:23,720 take with you. It's the networks of solidarity and influence that you build, 532 00:58:23,720 --> 00:58:28,870 the sharing of skill sets and cooperation that will allow you to influence people 533 00:58:28,870 --> 00:58:33,830 even outside your areas of expertise, going to politics, going to local 534 00:58:33,830 --> 00:58:37,120 officials, using the local officials to get the state officials, using the state 535 00:58:37,120 --> 00:58:41,690 officials to get to national, using the national to get to the international. What 536 00:58:41,690 --> 00:58:47,120 we have to do is we have to take a hard look at how the world actually operates 537 00:58:47,120 --> 00:58:52,500 today. Not how we wanted to operate, not how we think it operates, but to measure 538 00:58:52,500 --> 00:58:55,880 it, to see how it's actually function and to see where the money goes, to see who's 539 00:58:55,880 --> 00:59:02,810 using it, to see where the influence is. And in many cases, to seize control of 540 00:59:02,810 --> 00:59:10,150 that via whatever means that we have available to us. This is where we get the 541 00:59:10,150 --> 00:59:14,750 technical systems that, the people in this room have an extraordinary amount of 542 00:59:14,750 --> 00:59:18,880 influence over that. We may not have in the political realm. If you make a phone 543 00:59:18,880 --> 00:59:23,540 call and that gets used around the world, you can provide the same guarantees, the 544 00:59:23,540 --> 00:59:27,750 same protection to someone in China, to someone in Russia that they have in 545 00:59:27,750 --> 00:59:34,610 Germany, because technology can be agnostic to its use. And if we make these 546 00:59:34,610 --> 00:59:41,470 carve outs, if we make these sort of emissions, if we make concessions to 547 00:59:41,470 --> 00:59:48,700 power, to system, to government, to institutions, we have to think about how 548 00:59:48,700 --> 00:59:54,800 they will be used. The more rules in the system, the more lines of complexity there 549 00:59:54,800 --> 01:00:00,710 are, the greater the unseen attack surface that can be used against us. We need to 550 01:00:00,710 --> 01:00:09,310 design for tomorrow. But there is no time to wait. We need to be working today. 551 01:00:09,310 --> 01:00:21,390 *Applause.* And if I could just say one thing. Thank 552 01:00:21,390 --> 01:00:24,590 you, everyone, for your patience and for bearing with us through all of this. I'm 553 01:00:24,590 --> 01:00:30,260 gonna shut up and give this back to Robert, but everybody asks, you know, how 554 01:00:30,260 --> 01:00:35,110 can I make a difference? This is all very good. It's very abstract. Again, be 555 01:00:35,110 --> 01:00:39,230 opportunistic. Look at where you can make a difference right now. In the case of 556 01:00:39,230 --> 01:00:43,230 these families, we are almost across the finish line. We had been in this fight for 557 01:00:43,230 --> 01:00:48,500 years and we are about to win. We can do it with your help. So please, if you can 558 01:00:48,500 --> 01:01:03,870 support them, do. Thank you. *Applause* 559 01:01:03,870 --> 01:01:09,360 Herald: I have to extend a huge thanks to you, Mr. Robert, to go to you. Edward 560 01:01:09,360 --> 01:01:14,010 Snowden, thank you for coming on our stream and thank you, Vanessa, for coming 561 01:01:14,010 --> 01:01:21,030 to us as well. This is, this was a lovely event and Mr. Snowden asked you to help. 562 01:01:21,030 --> 01:01:27,270 And this is how, this is how, Robert, if you like to say some last words? 563 01:01:27,270 --> 01:01:33,090 RT: I would. This has been a long fight. It's we're in the eighth year now, and 564 01:01:33,090 --> 01:01:39,770 there's no way that we're gonna get to the finish line unless donations are made. 565 01:01:39,770 --> 01:01:44,250 Whatever you can help with, if it's if it's a small amount of change, that's 566 01:01:44,250 --> 01:01:47,720 fine. If you can donate something more significantly. Of course, that's going to 567 01:01:47,720 --> 01:01:55,670 help. But it's all about food, rent, utilities, and also for Vanessa and Keana 568 01:01:55,670 --> 01:02:01,640 and Montreal. We, the NGO, is under a legal obligation to continue to support 569 01:02:01,640 --> 01:02:07,160 them financially for the first full year, that they're there in Montreal and they do 570 01:02:07,160 --> 01:02:13,430 need that support. The one thing all stresses the climate has been a big shock 571 01:02:13,430 --> 01:02:19,120 for Vanessa and Keana, and it costs a lot of money to get winter jackets or, you 572 01:02:19,120 --> 01:02:25,960 know, jackets for autumn shoes, boots. So it's been at times it's been rough for 573 01:02:25,960 --> 01:02:31,060 them. But one solution is the donations that make sure they have warm clothes and 574 01:02:31,060 --> 01:02:36,020 food, etc.. And of course, the clients in Hong Kong that they have almost no 575 01:02:36,020 --> 01:02:42,060 government humanitarian support. So if you can donate. We continue to donate. We all 576 01:02:42,060 --> 01:02:46,250 appreciate this. And thank you so much. 577 01:02:46,250 --> 01:02:57,290 *Applause* 578 01:02:57,290 --> 01:03:01,310 *36c3 postroll music* 579 01:03:01,310 --> 01:03:25,000 Subtitles created by c3subtitles.de in the year 2020. Join, and help us!