legal window to leave the country freely. he wasn't wanted, he wasn't on a watch list, but there's a kicker to this note as well, this press release from the hong kong government here. they're also saying that they are now going to write to the united states and ask, to president obama, and ask why, because of the information provided by edward snowden, why was the united states hacking computers here in hong kong and china. so, this not only letting edward snowden go, but you have this other issue brewing as well now, alison. >> so, is this kind of like hong kong thumbing its nose at the u.s.? >> reporter: you could apply that analysis, and certainly, there is on the face of it, it looks like that. we are talking to other political analysts here who are saying, look, there's no way that hong kong would want to do this without some kind of conversation with u.s. officials, that hong kong was caught between a rock and a hard place. it didn't want to damage its relationship to the united states, because the extradition