Spy chief lashes ‘unrepentant’ US traitor Snowden

BRITAIN’S ability to keep its citizens safe was compromised as a result of the intelligence leaks by US traitor Edward Snowden, a spy chief revealed in a blistering attack yesterday.

Jeremy Fleming, head of Britain’s eavesdropping agency GCHQ, said the unrepentant former spy had caused ‘real and unnecessary damage’ to the security of the UK and its allies.

In his first remarks on the devastating impact of the security breach five years ago, he said the fugitive, who is now living in exile in Russia, needed to be held to account for his ‘illegal’ actions. His comments came as Snowden said he had ‘no regrets’ about revealing sensitive information via the pages of The Guardian.

In a rare statement given on the anniversary of the biggest leak of top-secret documents in history, Mr Fleming said: ‘GCHQ’s mission is to help keep the UK safe. What Edward Snowden did five years ago was illegal and compromised our ability to do

‘Unnecessary damage’

causing real and unnecessary damage to the security of the UK and our allies. He should be accountable for that.’

Mr Fleming, who was deputy director general of MI5 until last year, also made clear that the agency was striving for greater transparency long before the leaks. In a pointed remark, he told The Guardian: ‘It’s important that we continue to be as open as we can be, and I am committed to the journey we began over a decade ago to greater transparency.’

His comments came as Snowden, 34, showed no remorse over leaking classified data from the US National Security Agency (NSA). Speaking to The Guardian, he said: ‘People say nothing has changed: that there is still mass surveillance. That is not how you measure change. Look back before 2013 and look at what has happened since. Everything changed.

‘The Government and corporate sector preyed on our ignorance. But now we know. People are aware now. People are still powerless to stop it but we are trying. The revelations made the fight more even.’ Asked if he had any regrets he said ‘no’, before adding: ‘If I had wanted to be safe, I would not have left Hawaii.’

Snowden was living in Hawaii while he worked as a contractor for the NSA. It was there that he acquired the data he later leaked, including details of the precise methods used by spy agencies to track terrorist plots. A year after the leaks – by which time Snowden had fled to Hong Kong before subsequently settling in Russia – it was estimated that a quarter of the serious criminals being tracked by GCHQ had fallen off the radar because they had been alerted to the methods being used to track them.

Theresa May, as Home Secretary, has previously revealed how Britain’s ability to track terrorists and crime gangs was severely damaged as a result of the leaks. She said police and security services were finding it harder to monitor the electronic communications used by fanatics and master criminals.

The former head of GCHQ, Sir Iain Lobban, said in 2013 that terrorists were known to be ‘discussing how to avoid vulnerable communications methods’. Just last month, Bill Evanina, director of the US National Counter-intelligence and Security Centre, said Snowden’s leaks would continue to cause problems for years to come. He told a conference that only about 1 per cent of the documents taken by him had been released.