John Robles

John Anthony Robles II (born 10 April 1966) is a journalist and presenter on the Voice of Russia the Russian government's international radio broadcasting service. He is the presenter of the English Language program Moscow Mailbag which answers questions from listeners all over the world on all aspects of the USSR and Russia.

He was born a US Citizen in Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico, Puerto Rico being a US territory and is of Taino Indian extraction.

John and his two American born children were granted full political asylum in the Russian Federation in 2007 after the US Embassy in Moscow revoked his US passport.

John was the first US citizen to receive asylum in the Russian Federation. Although there there are reports which state that both he and Edward Snowden have been granted political asylum in Russia, Edward Snowden was in fact only granted temporary asylum and then residency and does not have political asylum in the Russian Federation. John has since renounced his US citizenship and applied for Russian citizenship in 2010 along with his son John Anthony Robles III and daughter Kayla Marie Robles.

Robles attended the Pennsylvania State University where he took an undergraduate course in Soviet Studies, majoring in the Russian Language. He taught at the BKC-Ih School for Foreign Languages in Moscow, Russia, for thirteen years.

Living in Moscow in March 2007 John Robles applied to have his US passport renewed at the US Embassy. His passport was revoked however and the embassy refused to issue him with a new one. An accusation was made that Robles owed child support in Yolo County California. Robles disputed this as he had full custody of his 2 children and had raised them on his own. He claimed neither he nor his children had been in the US since 1995. He had been issued a new passport previously in 1998 after it had been stolen. It was after his passport was revoked that he was granted political asylum in Russia. Robles had been running a political website critical of the actions of President George W. Bush and hosted in Russia since July 2003.

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