Anna Chapman Upset Over Edward Snowden Proposal Question, Walks Out on NBC Interview
Famed Russian international spy Anna Chapman walked out of an interview with NBC after she was pressed with a question regarding her proposal to Edward Snowden via Twitter.
Chapman, who was deported from the United States after she was arrested in 2010 while spying for Russia, agreed to talk with NBC's Richard Engel about her Russian TV show, "Mysteries of the World."
When Engel asked her if the tweet was a joke or for real, Chapman said in a clip aired by NBC News, "I'm not going to talk about this." When he persisted, she said, "Okay. The interview is finished. I'm sorry."
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In the first few minutes of the Engle interview, she told him, "I'm a very private, discreet person and I still don't do many interviews because I just don't like to share. I don't believe that people would be interested in knowing about somebody's life."
Engle talked about the interview on the "Today" show, calling it "a bit of a strange one."
"In some ways it is ironic that Chapman now hosts a television show about aliens and mysteries, because the FBI investigation into her sleeper cell, get this, was codenamed 'Ghoststories,'" Engel told the "Today" show.
After watching Chapman, along with 10 other Russian agents for ten years, U.S. authorities were led to move in and arrest all members of the spy network because of one video. It was a recording of a drop with an FBI agent posing as a Russian consulate employee who met with Chapman at a New York coffee shop in June of 2010.
No classified information was ever stolen and Chapman was arrested, but the scenario may not be worthy of a James Bond Hollywood spy thriller. The Russian agents came to believe the U.S. government agents were actually their handlers.
