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Edward Snowden has apparently been living a life of poverty in Russia, surviving on meager charitable donations.

Russian officials and human rights activists on Thursday slammed the U.S. for “threatening Russia” in a bid to have former NSA contractor Edward Snowden returned, as suspense mounts over the fugitive’s impending departure from Sheremetyevo Airport. “They [the U.S.] are asking Russia to discriminate against a U.S. citizen who has turned to Russia for temporary asylum and thus blatantly violate human rights,” Anatoly Kucherena, a lawyer who is currently advising Snowden on immigration and other issues, told Interfax. In an unusual demonstration of solidarity with the government-connected lawyer, Svetlana Gannushkina, a prominent independent human rights activist who was nominated for...

Russia gives Snowden pass to leave airport RUSSIA'S migration service has provided fugitive US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden with a document that allows him to leave the Moscow airport transit zone where he has been holed up for the past month, the RIA Novosti news agency says. The document confirms that his application for asylum is being considered, but allows Snowden to cross the Russian border so long as border guards do not object, it said on Wednesday. The Interfax news agency said Snowden could leave the airport in the "next hours". The Interfax news agency added that the document...

NAANTALI, Finland Russian President Vladimir Putin bluntly rejected U.S. pleas to turn over National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden on Tuesday, saying he is free to travel wherever he wants and insisting that Russian security agencies haven't contacted him. Snowden is in the transit zone of a Moscow airport and has not passed through Russian immigration, Putin said, meaning he is not technically in Russia. ... A high-ranking Ecuadorean official told The Associated Press that Russia and Ecuador were discussing where Snowden could go, saying the process could take days. He also said Ecuador's ambassador to Moscow had not seen...

Whereabouts of former NSA contractor whose leaks to Guardian have caused global controversy a mystery after he does not catch expected flight to Cuba

EXCERPT Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said in a letter on Monday that if the U.S. and Russia are to have a constructive relationship, Russia must cooperate with American authorities and apprehend Snowden.

Edward Snowden, the former US intelligence contractor who leaked classified documents revealing US internet and phone surveillance, has asked Ecuador for asylum. The request was confirmed by Ecuador's foreign minister on Twitter. Mr Snowden had fled the US for Hong Kong but flew out on Sunday morning and is currently in Moscow.

Former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden will fly from Moscow to Cuba on Monday and then plans to go to Venezuela, a source at the Russian airline Aeroflot said on Sunday. The source said Snowden was already on his way to Moscow from Hong Kong and would leave for Havana within 24 hours. The South China Morning Post also reported that Snowden had left Hong Kong for Moscow and that his final destination might be Ecuador or Iceland. The WikiLeaks anti-secrecy website said Snowden was heading for an unnamed "democratic nation". The flight to Moscow prompted speculation that...

US whistleblower Edward Snowden is en route to Moscow from Hong Kong on an Aeroflot flight, reports AFP. Washington has filed an extradition order to the Hong Kong authorities on charges of espionage, theft and conversion of government property. DETAILS TO FOLLOW.