Britain begins probe of Snowden leaks
LONDON – Britain has launched a criminal investigation into Edward Snowden’s leak of classified material to The Guardian newspaper and is sifting through documents it seized from the partner of one of the paper’s journalists, a government lawyer said Thursday.
The revelation by lawyer Jonathan Laidlaw came at London’s High Court, where lawyers for David Miranda – the partner of Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald – unsuccessfully sued to stop police from combing through digital material seized from him Sunday at Heathrow Airport.
It was the British government’s first mention of a criminal investigation linked to the seized material, which included a laptop, cellphone, DVDs and memory sticks.
Greenwald has been at the center of the Guardian’s disclosures about the National Security Agency, which have pulled back the curtain on the American government’s secret domestic espionage program. Miranda, a 28-year-old Brazilian student, was detained for nearly nine hours as he flew through the London airport after meeting in Germany with a journalist who was working with Greenwald.
Laidlaw said British police had already begun scanning through Miranda’s tens of thousands of pages of documents, which he described as “highly sensitive.”
Mubarak put under house arrest at hospital
CAIRO – Egypt’s ousted leader Hosni Mubarak was released from prison Thursday and transported to a military hospital in a Cairo suburb where he will be held under house arrest, according to state TV.
Prime Minister Hazem el-Beblawi had ordered that Mubarak be put under house arrest as part of the emergency measures imposed this month after a wave of violence sparked by the ouster of Islamist leader Mohammed Morsi, who had succeeded Mubarak as Egypt’s first freely elected President.
Thursday’s move followed a court decision ordering the release in relation to charges of receiving gifts from a state-owned newspaper.
The release threatened to stoke the unrest as the Arab nation is already roiled in a crisis over a military coup against Morsi.
But the decision to place him under house arrest instead of letting him go free appeared designed to ease some of the criticism about releasing Mubarak and to ensure that he appears in court next week.
Despite his release, the 85-year-old ousted leader still faces retrial on charges of complicity in the killing of protesters in the 2011 uprising against him..
Associated Press
