Putin offers U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden asylum - on condition he stops damaging 'American partners' with further leaks

Snowden has asked for asylum in Russia, according to a consular official

Vladimir Putin said 'Russia never hands anybody anywhere and has no intention to do so'

He said Snowden must stop damaging leaks if he wants to stay in Russia



Whistleblower is officially staying in the transit area of a Moscow airport

Whistleblower Edward Snowden has asked for asylum in Russia, according to a Russian consular official.



Kim Shevchenko, the duty officer at the Russian Foreign Ministry's consular office in Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport, has said Snowden's representative, Sarah Harrison, handed over his request yesterday, according to reports.



Earlier today Vladimir Putin dramatically offered U.S. whistleblower Snowden political asylum - as long as he stops damaging 'our American partners' with his leaks.



A Russian consular official said Snowden asked for asylum in Russia.



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Seeking asylum: Vladimir Putin has offered asylum to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, pictured, who has been charged with espionage and theft



The Russian strongman made his invitation as he is also set to sound out Venezuela president Nicolas Maduro about taking the renegade ex-spy whose laptops are crammed with secrets. 'Russia never hands over anybody anywhere and has no intention to do so,' said the Kremlin leader, defying a specific U.S. request. 'If he [Snowden] wants to remain here there is one condition - he should stop his work aimed at inflicting damage on our American partners no matter how strange this may sound coming from me.' Russian President: Vladimir Putin said Snowden can stay in Russia if he stops the leaks On the one hand Putin is snubbing U.S. demands for any country to handover a man who has been labelled a traitor in Washington.

But he also showed he does not want to provoke a new Cold War in relations with the U.S. by firmly insisting Snowden should stop his disclosures on covert operations which have caused embarrassment to America and infuriated the country's allies in the EU.

Allies have been stunned by the apparent scale and audacity of American espionage.

Putin was also insistent that Russian secret services had not sought to glean Snowden war chest of secrets, a statement some will find hard to believe coming from a former Soviet KGB spy.

'He is not our agent and does not cooperate with us,' Putin said. 'Our secret services never worked with him and are not working with him now.' 'He does not feel like he is an agent of the secret services, he considers himself to be a human rights campaigner, a new dissident, something like Sakharov,' he added, referring to famous Soviet-era rights campaigner and physicist Andrei Sakharov. As such, Snowden is unlikely to want to be gagged from revealing secrets he feels he must expose to change America, so will find the Russian curbs hard to accept.

The announcement will be an embarrassment to President Obama, who said earlier today that the U.S. has held 'high-level' discussions with Russia to get Snowden back to the United States. Amid reports that Snowden may be seeking asylum in as many as 15 countries, Venezuela looked like a clear option last night with the country's president Tuesday due to hold talks with Putin during his trade mission to Moscow. RELATED ARTICLES Previous

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Next Is Ed Snowden set to claim asylum in Venezuela when... 'Spying on allies is not unusual': John Kerry hits back at... Share this article Share 'The question on Snowden's asylum in Venezuela will be on the agenda of both presidents,' said a source in Putin's administration, according to Izvestia. 'But the final decision on the possibility of giving political asylum and on ways of transporting Snowden to Caracas will be made by Nicolas Maduro.' Maduro is on record saying: 'No one has up to this point formally asked us to give political asylum to this young person, Snowden.

Hideout: Snowden is currently in the transit area of Sheremetievo airport in Moscow



'If they asked us for it, we'd think about it, think about it. And it's almost certain that we'd give it to him.



'Why? Because asylum is an international humanitarian right to protect those who are being pursued for noble causes.'

Maduro could help get Snowden - who currently has no valid travel document - out of Russia where he is causing strained relations with the U.S. at a time when Ecuador has cooled on taking him in.

With Ecuador cooling on Snowden, the paper said that 'it is possible that Maduro will be flying from Sheremetyevo - and will take Snowden with him.'

'Venezuela is no doubt the best - and actually the only - option for Snowden,' said Mikhail Belyat, a Latin American specialist at the Russian State Humanitarian University.

'Of course there is protocol, but the new leader of Venezuela - like the old one - is known for his extravagant behaviour and actions, including in foreign politics, so I will not be surprised if Maduro will take Snowden with him.'



Following an outcry over U.S. spy claims, President Obama said today that it would provide allies with information about new reports that the National Security Agency bugged European Union offices in Washington, New York and Brussels.



The latest revelations were attributed in part to information supplied by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.



He said: 'We should stipulate that every intelligence service - not just ours, but every European intelligence service, every Asian intelligence service, wherever there's an intelligence service - here's one thing that they're going to be doing: they're going to be trying to understand the world better and what's going on in world capitals around the world,' he said.



Surprise: Barack Obama said before Putin's announcement that 'high-level' talks had been held between Russia and the U.S. to deport Snowden to America

'If that weren't the case, then there'd be no use for an intelligence service.

'And I guarantee you that in European capitals, there are people who are interested in, if not what I had for breakfast, at least what my talking points might be should I end up meeting with their leaders. That's how intelligence services operate,' Obama added.

European officials from Germany, Italy, France, Luxembourg and the EU government itself say the revelations could damage negotiations on a trans-Atlantic trade treaty between the EU and the United States.



Agreeing to start those talks was one of the achievements reached at meetings last month in Northern Ireland between Obama and the European members of the Group of Eight industrialized economies.

Obama said the NSA will evaluate the claims in the German publication and will then inform allies about the allegations.

At the same time, he tried to reassure allies such as German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and British Prime Minister David Cameron that he relies on personal relationships, not spying, to determine what other leaders have on their minds.

'I'm the end user of this kind of intelligence,' he said. 'And if I want to know what Chancellor Merkel is thinking, I will call Chancellor Merkel.



'If I want to know President Hollande is thinking on a particular issue, I'll call President Hollande. And if I want to know what, you know, David Cameron's thinking, I call David Cameron.



'Ultimately, you know, we work so closely together that there's almost no information that's not shared between our various countries.'

Obama's remarks came shortly after Hollande demanded on Monday that the United States immediately stop any eavesdropping on European Union diplomats.

Snowden is officially in the transit zone of Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport, say Russian officials, where he is beyond the reach of the long arm of U.S. law.

Venezuelan President: Nicolas Maduro said last week that fleeing whistleblower Edward Snowden is 'almost sure' to get a political asylum in his country if he files a formal request

Ecuadorean President: Rafael Correa said earlier this week he had yet to consider letting U.S. intelligence leaker Edward Snowden enter his country but was said to be going cold on the idea

However, it is understood he is in fact living in four star comfort in hotel accommodation some distance from the terminal.



An employee of the nearby luxury Novotel Hotel, sited outside the transit zone, claimed he had stayed early last week at a time when the guest register showed a Daniel Snowden, with unknown nationality, as a guest.



'I recognize him from his picture,' she said, adding that he moved to another hotel.



He is being increasingly portrayed as a hero on state-run television and senior MP Alexei Pushkov, who heads the parliamentary international affairs committee, said it would be 'morally impermissible' to hand the fugitive over to the United States.



Ecuador's president Rafael Correa said on Saturday that Snowden is 'under the care of Russian authorities', while also suggesting they did not let him reach the country's Moscow embassy where he could apply for asylum.

France president Francois Hollande has demanded that the U.S. immediately stop any eavesdropping on European Union diplomats

Meanwhile, a Kremlin-inspired media blitz involving some of the biggest names in Russian espionage has been mounted to flatter Snowden and apparently plant the notion of offering a permanent safe haven to the 30-year-old ex-CIA staffer.

Legendary KGB spy Mikhail 'Smiling Mike' Lyubimov, 79, expelled from Britain in the Cold War after seeking to recruit top Tory and Labour politicians, suggested offering him asylum and 'finding him a good wife' like traitors Kim Philby and George Blake.



'He belongs to the anti-globalists whom I admire and love - in the end these are the people that will rescue the world,' he said. 'I don't exclude that our parliament will decide to give him asylum.'



In several rapidly-aired shows on state-run TV, Snowden was flattered as 'a soldier in the information war, who fights, of course, on the side of Russia'.



While he hides in Moscow 'the pulse of world history is beating here'.



Security specialist Igor Korotchenko said: 'Whose protection does he want: Ecuador, Venezuela or Russia? It is hard to judge right now.



'In Russia, he will find a country capable of guaranteeing his security.'



Moscow offered a more secure solution than Latin America, he urged.



Ex-FSB officer Kirill Kabanov, a member of Putin's Human Right's Council, openly stated Snowden should be granted Russian asylum because he possesses 'potentially useful information'.



The chairman of the council, Mikhail Fedotov, insisted: 'A person who has made public secret operations by secret services that endanger the security of thousands of people deserves political asylum.'



He urged: 'If Snowden addresses the Russian authorities with such a request, it should be considered in keeping with the applicable legislation.'

