Faced with criticism on the surveillance issue in the wake of whistleblower Edward Snowden’s disclosures, US President Barack Obama has promised reforms to win back the Americans’ trust that the intelligence efforts are in line with national interests and values.
“And to others around the world I want to make clear once again that America is not interested in spying on ordinary people,” Obama told a White House News Conference.Obama, who was accused of double-talk with critics viewing his administration’s actions on surveillance as total contrast to his espousal of privacy concerns as a Senator, said the reforms he is seeking would boost oversight and transparency.
He, however, denied any official abuse of the surveillance programmes, asserting: “Our intelligence is focused, above all, on finding the information that’s necessary to protect our people, and, in many cases, our allies.”laying out four steps in a bid to win back public trust on this issue, Obama said he will work with the US Congress to reform a key section of the anti-terror Patriot Act in respect of the programme that collects phone records, and to improve people’s confidence in the oversight conducted by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, paying attention to personal liberty.
He maintained that the programme does not allow the Government to listen to any phone calls without a warrant. Even so, given the concerns of those who worry that it could be subject to abuse, he said he would be willing to put in place steps for greater oversight, transparency, and constraints on the use of this authority.By way of transparency, Obama said he has directed the intelligence to make public as much information about the surveillance programmes as possible. “We’ve already declassified unprecedented information about the NSA, but we can go further,” he said.
He also announced that a high-level group of outside experts was being constituted to review the entire intelligence and communications technologies, and also consider how to maintain the trust of the people and ensure there is no abuse in the use the surveillance technologies. The group will provide an interim report in 60 days and a final report by year-end on how the surveillance programmes impact security, privacy and foreign policy.
Obama, while fielding questions, defended his decision to cancel his scheduled summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin next month over asylum to Snowden and other unresolved bilateral issues.
He, however, rejected the idea of America boycotting the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia next February. “I want to just make very clear right now I do not think it’s appropriate to boycott the Olympics. We’ve got a bunch of Americans out there who are training hard, who are doing everything they can to succeed,” he said.Obama, in reply to a question, said he had better success working with Putin’s predecessor, Dmitry Medvedev, getting the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START II) done. “We were able to cooperate on Iran sanctions. They provided us help in terms of supplying our troops in Afghanistan. We were able to get Russia into the WTO,” he said.
He then went on to say that after Putin returned as President, there has been “more rhetoric on the Russian side that was anti-American, that played into some of the old stereotypes about the Cold War contests between the United States and Russia”, adding: “I’ve encouraged Mr Putin to think forward as opposed to backwards on those issues — with mixed success.”
Stating that the Snowden episode is just one more in a number of emerging differences with Russia over the last several months on issues such as Syria and human rights, Obama commented: “It is probably appropriate for us to take a pause, reassess where it is that Russia is going, what our core interests are, and calibrate the relationship.”