MOSCOW, June 24. /ITAR-TASS/. Russian Federal Migration Service (FMS) declined to comment on the possibility of asylum prolongation for the former CIA contractor Edward Snowden, now in Russia.

“This is confidential information that cannot be disclosed to the media,” Valentina Kazakova, who is in charge of citizenship issues at the FMS said on Monday.

In the US, Snowden was charged with disclosing secret information to be punished with a long prison term.

After revealing the National Security Agency’s electronic surveillance, he fled to Hong Kong last June. Snowden then headed for Moscow on his way to Ecuador, but had to stay in Russia after the US had annulled his passport. On August 1, 2013, the whistleblower was granted a one-year temporary asylum in Russia after more than a month in the Sheremetyevo airport transit zone.