Edward Snowden may be in Russia for a little while longer.

The former NSA contractor, who leaked 1.7 million top-secret documents that exposed the agency's massive surveillance tactics, petitioned Russia for an extension on his asylum, according to his lawyer Anatoly Kucherena.

"The procedure is very simple if a citizen of any country would like to stay and live in Russia. In this case we are talking about Snowden, so we have fulfilled the procedure to receive temporary asylum,” Kucherena said on Wednesday, according to Russian state media.

Snowden fled to Russia in June 2013 shortly after he came forward as the source of Glenn Greenwald's explosive report about an NSA program called PRISM. He remained in Moscow's airport for weeks as he applied for asylum in more than 20 other countries. While Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia had expressed willingness to accept him, the United States pressured countries to deny him refuge.

Russia officially granted him asylum for one year on Aug. 1, 2013. It is set to expire in a few weeks.

Snowden, who is wanted in the U.S. on charges of espionage and theft of government property, has recently made several appearances via satellite video and one in-person interview with Brian Williams. In those interviews, Snowden, who supporters laud as a whistleblower and skeptics call a traitor, has repeatedly said that he regretted nothing and that he did what he did for his country.

The former NSA contractor has also said he would like to return to the U.S. if given amnesty. Russia's decision to grant Snowden asylum put even more strain on the already-tense relationship between President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Last year, Putin said Russia wasn't protecting Snowden but had no legal basis to extradite him.

Meanwhile, more revelations continue to surface from those documents that Snowden leaked — something he assured would happen during an interview earlier this year in which he said the biggest revelations are yet to come. Just this week, The Intercept reported that the NSA and the FBI spied on five prominent Muslim-Americans between 2002 and 2008, based on information from Snowden's leak.