Former National Security Agency employee Edward Snowden released an open letter to Brazil stating he will help them investigate NSA spying on Brazilian soil if the country grants him political asylum, the Associated Press reported.
The letter was printed in portuguese in todays edition of the Folha de de Sao Paulo, one of Brazil's largest and influential newspapers.
With the recent Supreme Court ruling labeling the NSA phone spying "unconstitutional," Snowden says in the letter that "NSA's culture of indiscriminate global espionage is collapsing," and that he has become inspired by the global debate his revelations have brought forth, according to the AP.
In the letter, Snowden states he stands behind Brazil's "strong stance" against the United States after he revealed the NSA had been tapping Brazilian citizens internet and phone, as well as President Dilma Rousseff's private cell phone calls, the AP reported.
Snowden also stated he would like to help a further investigation into the extent of the NSA snooping on Brazilian soil, but could only do so if the country grants him political asylum because the U.S. "government will continue to interfere with my ability to speak."
According to the documents Snowden handed over to Brazil-based American journalist Glenn Greenwald in June, Brazil is the main target of NSA snooping out of all the other Latin American countries, the AP reported. The files also revealed the hacking of the internal network of state-run oil company Petrobras.
"There is a huge difference between legal programs, legitimate spying ... and these programs of dragnet mass surveillance that put entire populations under an all-seeing eye and save copies forever," Snowden wrote in the letter. "These programs were never about terrorism: they're about economic spying, social control, and diplomatic manipulation. They're about power."
When the files were released, President Rousseff was enraged and even cancelled an upcoming trip to the White House in October, according to the AP.
The Brazilian government have asked for the assistance of Snowden during hearings about the NSA specific targeting of the country, and both Greenwald and his Brazilian domestic partner David Miranda, who was stopped at a UK airport for nine hours shortly after the initial release of the files, spoke before the Senate, the AP reported.
Miranda, who received Snowden's original letters through "secure means," has taken on the challenge of convincing the country to give the analyst political asylum.
"Brazil is a big, strong country, I think one of the few nations in the world that could offer asylum to Edward Snowden," Miranda told the AP during a phone interview. "He's helped so many nations, and I think mine like all others that have sworn to defend human rights should step forward to help him now."
Since the letter ran on Tuesday, he country has not released a statement on their decision about Snowdens request, although they ignored his initial request in July, the AP reported.
