Snowden justifies his Russian citizenship by Washington's order to cancel his US passport

MADRID, 3 Dic. (EUROPA PRESS) -

Former US Security Agency (NSA) analyst Edward Snowden has recalled that he is in Russia – a country that has just given him his new Russian passport – because the White House ordered his passport to be annulled.

"I'm in Russia because the White House intentionally canceled my passport to trap me here," Snowden recalled in a message posted on Twitter.

In addition, Snowden has highlighted that they forced a Bolivian diplomatic plane to land in Austria to try to arrest him in 2013. "They made the Bolivian president's diplomatic plane land to prevent me from leaving and continue to this day interfering with my freedom of movement. In case It had not been clear," he stressed.

Snowden is referring to a 2013 incident in which the Bolivian presidential plane was forced to land in Austria after being denied the right of way by other European countries. The plane left Russia and was supposedly heading to Cuba with Snowden on board, a point that he finally denied.

Snowden has received a Russian passport, his lawyer, Anatoli Kucherena, confirmed on Friday after Russian President Vladimir Putin granted him citizenship in September.

"Edward yesterday received a passport of a Russian citizen and took an oath in line with the law," Kucherena, a lawyer, told Russia's Interfax news agency. "He is grateful to Russia for receiving citizenship and for being a full-fledged citizen of Russia," he added.

In this sense, he noted that "the most important thing is that, according to the Russian Constitution, he cannot be extradited to a foreign country", while revealing that Snowden's wife has also begun procedures to obtain Russian citizenship. "I think that the process will not last long", she has settled her.

Putin granted citizenship to Snowden in September, wanted by the US Justice for leaking extensive information about the National Security Agency (NSA) to Wikileaks. Snowden filed in November 2020 with his wife, Lindsay Mills, also an American, an application to receive Russian citizenship.

Snowden is wanted by the United States Justice after numerous secret documents were leaked in 2013 in which different espionage techniques carried out by the National Security agency were revealed, including illegal wiretapping of international political leaders.

Once he fled the United States, his first destination was Hong Kong, although he later ended up in Russia. In 2014 she received her first residence permit which, years later, would be extended indefinitely. That same year, one of her lawyers reported that Snowden would be willing to return to US soil "under certain conditions" and acknowledged that there were "negotiations" underway to that end.