NEW YORK, June 7. /TASS/. Former US National Security Agency (NSA) employee and whistleblower Edward Snowden said that, unlike Russia, other countries could not guarantee him safe political asylum.

"Basically, I wasn’t supposed to stay in Russia; it was a transit route, a transit stop on route to Latin America because of the openness that South America has shown for whistleblowers (those who reveal secret data of Western governments - TASS) in the past, particularly in the case of Julian Assange," Snowden told independent journalist Glenn Greenwald in an interview published on the Rumble video platform. "My identity was going to be revealed, and it was very likely I would no longer be able to travel onwards. So, immediately, we [decided that] I have to get out to a safe place of asylum, this is going to be Latin America. We had contacts, we had assurances [that] this would probably be our best bet."

The former NSA contractor admitted that he initially wanted to go to Europe, but all the diplomats he spoke to discouraged him and gave him no guarantees. "But as soon as I left China, it was leaked and the US government [found out] while I’m in the air with no communications. <...> I landed in Russia, and the border guard said: ‘Your passport doesn’t work.’" Snowden said that he spent 40 days in the Sheremetyevo airport transit zone, applying for asylum in 21 countries. According to him, a number of countries admitted that they were afraid of the US reaction and did not want to get involved in such a situation. "Small countries that were actually willing to say, ‘We would do this, but we don’t believe we can actually protect you because of the US practice of <…> kidnapping,'" Snowden added.

"At that point, I was out of options; I applied for asylum in Russia, and I was granted it. And actually, I’ve been left alone quite remarkably since then, which is really all that I could ask for in those circumstances," he revealed.