Snowden Dismisses Former CIA Director’s Criticism of Russia

MOSCOW, January 9 (Sputnik) – Edward Snowden, a whistleblower and former contractor of the US National Security Agency (NSA), disagreed with former CIA chief Michael Hayden, who described Russia as a miserable place in his 2013 speech, Snowden said in an interview with US broadcaster PBS.

“It was funny because he [Hayden] was talking about how I was — everybody in Russia is miserable. Russia is a terrible place. And I’m going to end up miserable and I’m going to be a drunk and I’m never going to do anything. I don’t drink. I’ve never been drunk in my life. And they talk about Russia like it’s the worst place on earth. Russia’s great,” Snowden said Thursday.

Hayden, who served as NSA director from 1999 until 2005 and CIA director between 2006 and 2009, has been a relentless critic of Edward Snowden, calling him a defector and a "troubled young man." Hayden also said in September 2013 that he was pessimistic about the prospects for Snowden's life in Russia, comparing it to lives of those defectors who fled to the Soviet Union, claiming they were "isolated, bored, lonely, depressed" and adding that most of them ended up being alcoholics, as cited by the Washington Post.

Former CIA employee and NSA contractor Edward Snowden drew international attention after leaking classified information about the NSA comprehensive global surveillance program in 2013. Snowden was charged with espionage by the United States following the revelations. In August 2013, the whistleblower was granted temporary asylum, and later a residency permit, in Russia for a three-year period.