After receiving temporary asylum in Russia, former U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) analyst Edward Snowden has yet to decide whether he will remain in this capital permanently, his lawyer Anatoly Kucherena said today.
Although at first moment Kucherena announced that Snowden would stay in this country and could apply for temporary residence and then citizenship, he now admits that his client will decide that in the future. He himself will announce it, he said.
The lawyer for the former NSA contractor stated that the latter is free to travel when he wants, even back to the United States, but he ruled out so far any immediate plan to leave Russia, he said, as quoted by Russia Today.
Pavel Durov, founder of the social networking website Vkontakte (In Touch), the so-called Russian Facebook, offered the 30 year-old young U.S. man employment in the information security department of the social network, the Itar-Tass news agency highlights.
Kucherena says that the issue of a house for Snowden, who revealed the Prism program of U.S. intelligence to access Internet servers and spy phone calls and emails, was decided for the moment.
To receive the temporary asylum, the former NSA contractor had to personally promise the Kremlin that it would suspend the publication of documents on U.S. intelligence practices.
The case of former contractor of the National Security Agency (NSA) Edward Snowden is far to influence political relations between Russia and the United States, which we aim to improve, said presidential sources.
Russia Reiterates Intention to Improve Ties with the US, Despite Snowden
The situation around Snowden is “far from having a significance able to influence the ties of our country and Washington”, said Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Foreign Policy Adviser Yuri Ushakov.
“We know the atmosphere created in the United States around the case of Snowden and speculation about a possible suspension of a visit by U.S. President Barack Obama to Russia, but we have seen no signs so far in this direction,” he said.
Obama is scheduled to meet in September with Putin prior to the summit of the Group of 20, in St. Petersburg, but the U.S. press speculated that the visit could be suspended if at that time the ex contractor for the NSA is still in Russia.
The information that triggered the crisis appeared in the British publication The Guardian is part of hundreds of documents that Snowden delivered to some journalists before traveling to Russia, on June 23, from Hong Kong.