MOSCOW, December 10 (Sputnik) — US whistleblower Edward Snowden said Wednesday that he no longer has access to any classified information and that all of it has been provided to journalists.
“I don’t have access to any classified information anymore. I destroyed my own access in the wake of Hong Kong. Everything had been provided to the journalists,” Snowden during an online conference with Amnesty International France.
“I can’t break news. That’s the role of the press, that’s not the role of myself as a whistleblower,” he added, noting that mass surveillance is taking place in every country that can afford a modern intelligence agency.
Former CIA employee and NSA contractor Edward Snowden leaked classified information on the US government's vast global electronic surveillance program while in Hong Kong in 2013 and was charged with espionage in the United States.
The whistleblower was later granted a one-year asylum and then a three-year residency permit by Russia.