Taoiseach urged to use ‘Charlton creativity’ to grant Snowden asylum

The Irish Government should treat whistleblower Edward Snowden’s asylum plea with the same creativity as the Jack Charlton era, it has been claimed.

With the former spy’s diplomatic approaches being ignored, Taoiseach Enda Kenny was urged to use some creativity to allow Snowden to land in the Republic.

The exiled intelligence officer has written to the Irish embassy in Moscow seeking help but an application for asylum can only be made if he sets foot in the country.

Independent TD Clare Daly claimed there was no strict adherence to rules when Jack Charlton was building his Irish teams in the 1980s and ’90s: “I seem to remember that it was deemed sufficiently important to get an Irish passport for Tony Cascarino on the grounds of a fictitious grandmother so he could be part of Jackie’s Army.

“I think a little bit of creativity [is needed] on the grounds of the very serious danger that this young man is under.”

Ms Daly said the asylum plea was a chance for Ireland to be a world leader in human rights.

After indicating Snowden’s request to apply for asylum was going nowhere, the Taoiseach also said he did not know if “Cascarino’s grandmother is fictitious or not”.

Charlton famously exploited the so-called Granny rule when building successive Irish teams for international campaigns, including bringing in John Aldridge, Scottish-born Ray Houghton and Cascarino, who scored 19 times for the Republic.

The striker’s mother had no blood links to Ireland but her adoption to an Irish family in England earned the right to Irish citizenship.

Ireland is one of 21 countries where Snowden has sought asylum.

The Irish Refugee Council claimed rules on asylum applications in Ireland are very strict with a “culture of disbelief” among adjudicating bodies. “But it is unprecedented in our experience for Ireland to have someone apply for asylum externally,” a spokeswoman said.

Mr Kenny stressed that Snowden’s request could not be considered because he is not in the country.

Earlier, Richard Boyd Barrett, from the left-wing People Before Profit party, had been refused permission to raise the Snowden case in the Dáil. He said: “It is difficult to know what could be more topical than the fairly sensational request of Edward Snowden for political asylum in this country.

“Mr Snowden fits any meaningful definition of a political refugee. It is already clear that he faces a very real prospect of reprisal by the US government for acting on his conscience and exposing their utterly unacceptable spying activities.”

Snowden’s best chance of finding refuge outside the US may hinge on the president of Venezuela, who was in Moscow yesterday meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro told Russian reporters his country has not received an application for asylum from Snowden and dodged the question of whether he would take Snowden away with him. But Maduro did defend him.

“He did not kill anyone and did not plant a bomb,” Maduro said, before meeting with Putin, the Interfax news agency reported. “What he did was tell a great truth in an effort to prevent wars. He deserves protection under international and humanitarian law.”

During the meeting, neither he nor Putin mentioned Snowden in their public statements.

Snowden had initially booked flights to Havana, Cuba, and then on to Caracas, Venezuela, before becoming trapped in legal limbo in Moscow.

Snowden withdrew his bid for asylum in Russia when he learned the terms Moscow had set out, according to Putin’s spokes- man Dmitry Peskov. Putin said Monday that Russia was ready to shelter Snowden as long as he stopped leaking US secrets.