WATCH: This Car Could've given Edward Snowden A Ride on Seeking Asylum in Ecuador

Moscow (CNN) -- The computer contractor who exposed details of U.S. surveillance programs was on the run late Sunday, seeking asylum in Ecuador with the aid of the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, the organization and Ecuador's Foreign Ministry announced.
Edward Snowden left Hong Kong after Washington sought his extradition on espionage charges, according to WikiLeaks, which facilitates the publication of classified information.
"He is bound for the Republic of Ecuador via a safe route for the purposes of asylum and is being escorted by diplomats and legal advisers from WikiLeaks," the group said. Ecuador's foreign ministry said it had received a request for asylum from Snowden, and a CNN crew spotted a car with diplomatic plates and an Ecuadorian flag at the Russian capital's international airport.
Ecuador has already given WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange refuge in its embassy in London for a year after he unsuccessfully fought extradition to Sweden in British courts.
In Washington, the response was swift. The Obama administration asked Ecuador, Cuba and Venezuela, not to admit Snowden or to expel him if they do, a senior Obama administration official told CNN on Sunday. It also urged countries through which he might pass not to accept him.
The Justice Department said it was "disappointed" in the decision by Hong Kong authorities to allow Snowden to leave the semi-autonomous Chinese territory, arguing it had followed the proper legal steps to have him held and sent back to the United States. U.S. and Hong Kong officials had "repeated engagements" over the case, and Attorney General Eric Holder discussed the matter with his counterpart in Hong Kong last week, the department said.
"At no point, in all of our discussions through Friday, did the authorities in Hong Kong raise any issues regarding the sufficiency of the U.S.'s provisional arrest request," a statement from the department said. "In light of this, we find their decision to be particularly troubling."
And a source familiar with the matter told CNN that the U.S. government has revoked Snowden's passport.
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said it was routine to revoke the passports of people charged with felonies. She would not comment specifically on the status of Snowden's passport but said anyone wanted on a felony charge, "such as Mr. Snowden," should be stopped from "any further international travel, other than is necessary to return him to the United States."
Among those accompanying Snowden is former Spanish judge Baltasar Garzon, now the lawyer for WikiLeaks and Assange, according to a statement from the organization.
"The WikiLeaks legal team and I are interested in preserving Mr. Snowden's rights and protecting him as a person," Garzon said. "What is being done to Mr. Snowden and to Mr. Julian Assange -- for making or facilitating disclosures in the public interest -- is an assault against the people."
Assange sought asylum in June 2012 to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning over allegations that he raped one woman and sexually molested another. He has repeatedly said the allegations are politically motivated and that he fears Sweden would transfer him to the United States.
There are no charges pending against Assange in the United States. But a U.S. Army private who military prosecutors say leaked a vast cache of classified documents to WikiLeaks is now being court-martialed on charges of aiding the enemy, and he faces life in prison if convicted.
Snowden has admitted he was the source who leaked classified documents about the NSA's surveillance programs to the British newspaper the Guardian and to The Washington Post. The documents revealed the existence of programs that collect records of domestic telephone calls in the United States and monitor the Internet activity of overseas residents.