They had never imagined that a knock at their door one late
summer night in 2013 would trigger a dramatic chain of events that
would rewrite the course of their lives.
Four years on, facing daily threats and the imminent fear of
deportation, Sri Lankan national Supun Kellapatha and his partner
Nadeeka Nonis say they have no regrets about opening the door. They
were glad they welcomed a tall, nervous-looking American man into
their tiny apartment.
The stranger at the door that night was the whistleblower Edward
Snowden—a former US intelligence contractor who leaked thousands of
classified government files to journalists from a hotel room in
Hong Kong. For two weeks after that leak in June 2013, Snowden was
untraceable. As American intelligence agencies launched a global
manhunt, the most wanted dissident in the world quietly shunted
between the homes of three refugee families in the most
impoverished, cramped, filthy, neglected ghettos of Hong Kong
before he boarded a plane for Moscow.
Now, the people who sheltered Snowden are themselves looking for
protection. As their home countries allegedly try to get them
extradited back and remaining in Hong Kong becomes unfeasible, the
families are desperately seeking asylum for themselves.
https://qz.com/948106/edward-snowdens-guardian-angels-in-hong-kong-have-been-abandoned-by-the-world/
