Russias Vladimir Putin: Edward Snowden

Edward Snowden: The effort to upgrade the relationship has fallen victim to the rapidly shrinking common ground between the former Cold War rivals, including extreme differences over the Syrian civil war, Russias domestic crackdown on civil rights and the breaking point the asylum granted to NSA leaker Edward Snowden, according to 660 News. We have informed the Russian government that we believe it would be more constructive to postpone the summit until we have more results from our shared agenda, the White House said in a statement, citing deep differences over missile defence, arms control, trade, global security and human rights. Russias disappointing decision to grant Edward Snowden temporary asylum was also a factor that we considered in assessing the current state of our bilateral relationship, it added and WASHINGTON President Barack Obamas five-year effort to reboot U.S.-Russian relations finally crashed Wednesday, as the White House abruptly cancelled his planned face-to-face summit with Russias Vladimir Putin. The U.S. and Russian foreign and defence ministers will sit down in Washington later this week, but Obama cancelled his planned early September summit in Moscow with Putin because of what the White House called a lack of recent progress on a wide array of critical issues. Such steps are not taken lightly, and the decision will almost certainly herald a new frostiness in already chilly ties. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.