'Russia's great' and I am sober, Snowden says about his life in the country

Edward Snowden would like everyone - especially his critics - to know that he is happy with life in Russia. Happy and also sober.

"They talk about Russia like it's the worst place on earth. Russia's great," the former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor told journalist James Bamford during an interview in Moscow for the PBS programme Nova, which had released a transcript of their conversation.

During the interview, Snowden focused on a speech that former NSA and CIA director Michael Hayden had given in which he predicted Snowden would get depressed and drunk.

"It was funny because he was talking about how I was - everybody in Russia was - miserable. Russia is a terrible place," Snowden recalled. "And I'm going to end up miserable, and I'm going to be a drunk and I'm never going to do anything."

Hayden's exact prediction during that speech was that Snowden would "end up like most of the rest of the defectors who went to the old Soviet Union: isolated, bored, lonely, depressed - and most of them ended up alcoholics".

But even after two Russian winters, vodka's siren song apparently has not had any sway over Snowden.