After more than a month living in the transit area of Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport Edward Snowden, the man responsible for the massive leak of National Security Agency documents, has been granted temporary asylum in Russia and has left the airport, according to the Washington Post.
Anatoly Kucherena, Snowden's Russian lawyer, told reporters that Snowden has left the airport and is headed to a secure location that is being kept secret since he is the "most wanted person on Earth," according to RT.
"I have just handed over to him papers from the Russian Immigration Service," Kucherena said. "They are what he needs to leave the transit zone."
Snowden has been granted asylum within Russia until July 31, 2014. He will be able to apply for asylum at that time if he chooses to. Now that he has been granted asylum Snowden Russia cannot hand over Snowden to American authorities since there is no extradition package between the two countries. The only way that Snowden will return to the United States is if he chooses to do so voluntarily, according to RT.
Russian President Vladimir Putin had said that Snowden needed to cease leaking secrets if he were to be granted asylum in Russia; just yesterday The Guardian ran an article about the NSA's XKeyscore surveillance system used for surveying the Internet. Kucherena told reporters that the information was given to The Guardian before Snowden had arrived in Russia and that it would have no effect on whether or not he would be granted asylum, according to RT.
Granting asylum to Snowden could make what is already a strained relationship between the United States and Russia even worse. It has been suggested the President Barack Obama might skip a scheduled trip to Russia in September if asylum was granted to Snowden.
Yuri Ushakov, an aide to President Putin, does not think that Snowden's refugee status will be a problem.
"We are aware of the atmosphere being created in the U.S. over Snowden, but we didn't get any signals [indicating a possible cancellation of the visit] from American authorities," Ushakov told RIA Novosti.
Snowden had fled the United States for Hong Kong in May before The Guardian published their story exposing the NSA's surveillance program. The United States pressured Beijing to turn over Snowden so he got on a plane to Moscow expected to board a flight to Cuba en route to Ecuador. While in Moscow the United States government revoked Snowden's passport and he was stranded.
