The father of American whistleblower Edward Snowden, who has been granted a temporary asylum by Russia, arrived in Moscow early Thursday to meet with his son for the first time since Edward became a fugitive.
Former National Intelligence Agency™s contractor leaked key American surveillance programs in June, making headlines throughout the world.
Russian television showed Lon Snowden, arriving at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport, where his son had spent more than a month in a transit area before Moscow agreed to grant him political asylum.
Lon was met by Snowden’s Russian lawyer, Anatoly Kucherena, upon his arrival, AFP reports.
The American leaker flew in to Moscow on June 23 from Hong Kong with a revoked US passport. There has been no reported sighting of him since he was granted asylum on August 1.
Washington protested Moscow for giving asylum to the 30-year-old former CIA contractor. He is wanted by the United States for charges of theft of government property and two offenses under the espionage statutes.
Edward Snowden revealed to British and American media details of massive domestic and foreign spying programs, under which the US super spy agency, NSA, and the Federal bureau of Investigation (FBI) are eavesdropping on millions of Americans and European phone records and the Internet data from major US Internet companies including Facebook, Yahoo, Google, Apple and Microsoft.
Snowden also revealed information about NSA espionage activities targeting friendly countries across the world.
He is now living in a secret location in fear of being tracked down by US law enforcers, according to his lawyer, Kucherena.
ARA/ARA
Copyright: Press TV