Russia won`t hand over Snowden to country with death penalty – Kremlin

"Snowden regards himself as a human rights defender, a fighter for the ideals of democracy and freedom; this is his sincere conviction or there is some other reason. Anyway, Russian human rights activists and organizations and their foreign colleagues acknowledge that. Therefore, the extradition of Snowden to such a country as the United States, which applies the death penalty, is impossible," Peskov said.

"Russia has never extradited anyone and it will not do that. Any cases of the sort have been prisoner exchanges," Peskov said.

Norway likely to reject Snowden asylum application

Norway said it had received an asylum application from US whistleblower Edward Snowden, but would likely reject it. 

"According to Norwegian law, it is not possible to seek asylum from outside the country, and according to standard procedure Edward Snowden's application will be rejected since [he] was in Russia when he applied," Pal Lonseth, state secretary at the Justice Ministry, told public broadcaster NRK.

"Our embassy in Moscow received a fax yesterday [Monday] afternoon with an asylum application that apparently was signed by Edward Snowden," Foreign Ministry spokesman Frode Andersen said.

Finland was trying to establish whether Snowden had sent an application, a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said.

Snowden could hypothetically stay in Russia on one condition - stop anti-american activity - Peskov

Former CIA officer Edward Snowden may stay in Russia if he quits anti-US activity, Russian presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov said. "Hypothetically Snowden could stay in Russia but on one condition - he must abandon his intentions to engage in any form of anti-American activity that could be damaging for the United States," Peskov said. 

Snowden sends political asylum requests to 15 countries - Peskov

Former CIA officer Edward Snowden has asked 15 countries to grant him political asylum, Russian presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov said.

"He has forwarded political asylum requests to 15 countries of the world," he said.

Russian Federal Migration Service hasn't received Snowden’s petition about political asylum

Russian Federal Migration Service /FMS/ still had not received a statement from former employee of the CIA Edward Snowden containing his request to grant him political asylum, the FMS, which deals with such requests, has reported to ITAR-TASS.

"We have not received Snowden’spetition", - the Service stated.

Snowden asked Russia for asylum, reconsidered after learning Moscow’s terms – Kremlin

Former CIA officer Edward Snowden has changed his mind; he is no longer seeking asylum in Russia, Russian presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov said.

"He has abandoned this idea and his request for permission to stay in Russia," he said.

Snowden did not ask Venezuela for asylum - Maduro, adding that he has no plans to take Snowden away from Moscow

Vemezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said that former CIA employee Edward Snowden did not ask Venezuela for political asylum. He als oadded that he has no plans to take Snowden away from Moscow, although he added that "Snowden deserves protection by international and humanitarian law as a person who told the truth".

Former CIA employee Edward Snowden has not requested political asylum in Venezuela, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said.

"So far, he has not asked Venezuela to grant him political asylum," Maduro said in Moscow. Asked whether or not he was going to take Snowden with him to Venezuela, Maduro said, smiling, that "we will take with us the numerous agreements on investments in the oil and gas sector."

Norwegian foreign ministry confirms Snowden’s request for political asylum

The Norwegian foreign ministry has confirmed that the former CIA employee Edward Snowden has requested political asylum in the country. "I can prove that. Our embassy received a fax message containing a request for political asylum yesterday night. It must have come from him and was signed by him, though we can’t run a check on it,” a Norwegian embassy official stated.

Meanwhile, NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden released a statement from Moscow saying he is "impressed at the efforts taken by so many” to help him. He also adds that he is disturbed by the Obama administration’s use of international intimidation tactics.

"On Thursday, President Obama declared before the world that he would not permit any diplomatic ‘wheeling and dealing’ over my case,” Snowden wrote. "Yet now it is being reported that after promising not to do so, the President ordered his Vice President to pressure the leaders of nations from which I have requested protection to deny my asylum petitions.”

"This kind of deception from a world leader is not justice, and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile. These are the old, bad tools of political aggression. Their purpose is to frighten, not me, but those who would come after me.”

Sarah Harrison, WikiLeaks' legal advisor to Edward Snowden, has made requests for asylum from a long list of nations including countries throughout Europe, Latin and Central America, and several others.

US whistleblower Snowden seeks asylum in 21 countries

US whistleblower Edward Snowden has lodged asylum applications with 21 countries, the Wikileaks organization said. Along with confirmed applications to Ecuador, Iceland and Russia, Snowden is now seeking asylum in other countries including Germany, France, China and Venezuela, a statement on the Wikileaks website reported.

The requests were submitted by a Wikileaks' lawyer to an official at the Russian consulate of Moscow's Sheremetyevo International Airport. The Russian authorities are delivering the applications to the relevant embassies in Moscow, the statement said.

Snowden has been camped out at the airport for more than a week as he seeks to avoid extradition to the United States on espionage charges for leaking details about wide-ranging US surveillance programmes.

Late Monday, Snowden accused the Obama administration of trying to prevent him from exercising his right to seek asylum.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Monday that Snowden should stop leaking classified information about US surveillance programmes to improve his chances of asylum.

Full list of countries where the request for political asylum was made:

the Republic of Austria, the Plurinational State of Bolivia, the Federative Republic of Brazil, the People’s Republic of China, the Republic of Cuba, the Republic of Finland, the French Republic, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Republic of India, the Italian Republic, the Republic of Ireland, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Republic of Nicaragua, the Kingdom of Norway, the Republic of Poland, the Russian Federation, the Kingdom of Spain, the Swiss Confederation, the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, the Republic of Ecuador and the Republic of Iceland.

WikiLeaks says it submitted Snowden asylum requests to 19 countries

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden released a statement Monday night from Moscow saying he is "impressed at the efforts taken by so many” to help him, with WikiLeaks hours later releasing a list of countries to be sent applications for asylum. Sarah Harrison, WikiLeaks' legal advisor to Edward Snowden, has made requests for asylum from a long list of nations, according to a news release posted to that organization’s website early Tuesday morning.

Requests were made following the initial bids submitted to Ecuador and Iceland, with the list now including countries throughout Europe, Latin and Central America, and several others. The complete list is below:

"The requests were made to a number of countries including the Republic of Austria, the Plurinational State of Bolivia, the Federative Republic of Brazil, the People’s Republic of China, the Republic of Cuba, the Republic of Finland, the French Republic, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Republic of India, the Italian Republic, the Republic of Ireland, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Republic of Nicaragua, the Kingdom of Norway, the Republic of Poland, the Russian Federation, the Kingdom of Spain, the Swiss Confederation and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela," the statement reads.

Snowden blames Obama for trying to block his right to seek asylum

Former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, charged with leaking secret U.S. surveillance information, on Monday said the Obama administration was denying him his right to seek asylum, according to a statement released by the WikiLeaks organization.

"It is being reported that after promising not to do so, the President ordered his Vice President to pressure the leaders of nations from which I have requested protection to deny my asylum petitions," Snowden said in a statement published on the WikiLeaks website, referring to President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden. "This kind of deception from a world leader is not justice, and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile."

The United States has been on an international manhunt for Snowden, a former National Security Agency contractor who faces espionage charges for leaking classified information about secret U.S. phone and Internet surveillance activity. He is believed to be holed up in the transit area of a Moscow airport.

"Although I am convicted of nothing, (the Obama administration) has unilaterally revoked my passport, leaving me a stateless person," Snowden said in a statement posted online by anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks.

"Without any judicial order, the administration now seeks to stop me exercising a basic right. A right that belongs to everybody. The right to seek asylum... Their purpose is to frighten, not me, but those who would come after me."

A Russian official on Monday said Snowden has applied for political asylum in Russia and Reuters saw a letter Snowden sent to Ecuador, thanking it for helping him get to Russia and examining his asylum request.

In the statement dated July 1 and signed "Edward Joseph Snowden," he blamed the Obama administration for adopting "the strategy of using citizenship as a weapon" in its efforts to block his search for asylum and said he was "unbowed in his convictions."

Snowden is traveling with Sarah Harrison, an activist with WikiLeaks. The group's founder Julian Assange has been granted asylum in Ecuador's London embassy, where he has been for just over a year.

Edward Snowden breaks silence, thanks Ecuador for helping him get to Russia

Former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden has broken his silence for the first time since he fled to Moscow eight days ago to say he remains free to make new disclosures about U.S. spying activity. In a letter to Ecuador, Snowden said the United States was illegally persecuting him for revealing its electronic surveillance programme, PRISM.

He also thanked Ecuador for helping him get to Russia and for examining his asylum request.

"I remain free and able to publish information that serves the public interest," Snowden said in an undated Spanish-language letter sent to President Rafael Correa of Ecuador, seen by Reuters.

"No matter how many more days my life contains, I remain dedicated to the fight for justice in this unequal world. If any of those days ahead realise a contribution to the common good, the world will have the principles of Ecuador to thank," part of the text read, according to a translation.

Snowden, who is believed to be holed up in the transit area of a Moscow airport, complained that the United States was illegally pursuing him for an act he said was in the public interest.

"While the public has cried out support of my shining a light on this secret system of injustice, the Government of the United States of America responded with an extrajudicial man-hunt costing me my family, my freedom to travel, and my right to live peacefully without fear of illegal aggression," he wrote.

Voice of Russia, RT, Reuters, dpa

Countries don't want to have a "new headache” granting political asylum to Snowden - expert

The former CIA officer Edward Snowden has asked for political asylum in 15 countries, including Russia, RIA Novosti reports with a reference to a representative of the Russian migration authorities who requested anonymity. According to RIA Novosti, the request was delivered by a Wikileaks activist, Sarah Harrison, who accompanied Snowden. As of Monday evening, Russia’s Foreign Ministry has not given an answer.

Lukyanov: Snowden belongs to those who, guided, possibly, by idealistic and noble considerations, create many problems for the people around them. There is no doubt that after making a relevant statement and thus, making public the information he found necessary to make public, he attracted everybody’s attention to himself. But then he narrowed considerably the number of countries where he could go since he needs countries with 100 per cent guarantees that he will not be handed over to the USA. And there are few countries in the world that can resist American pressure.

Snowden is nobody’s agent and acts independently, and still those countries where he arrives - China and Russia – do not feel that they have a moral right, necessity, and willingness to extradite him to the USA. That would not be nice. However, they do not want to have a "new headache” granting political asylum to him.

Therefore, I have certain doubts about the information that he has applied for shelter in 15 countries, acting through Russian diplomats. Because Russia is not eager to give him the permission to stay and is seeking to ensure his comfortable transfer to a third country so that would not be Russia’s problem. In case of failure, I believe that he will stay in this country because Russia will not extradite him to America under any circumstances. However, this is not what Russia would like to do.

This means that it would be a forced measure. It is very hard to find a country that will take in Snowden. Judging by the facts, Ecuador and Venezuela, despite their unfriendly attitude to the USA, are unwilling to create more problems for themselves.

Therefore, it is not clear what is meant by the above-mentioned 15 countries. Should a scandal with the bugging by the US special services of America’s European allies continue gaining speed, I can’t rule out that one of the European countries will grant shelter to Snowden - simply to express its dissatisfaction with and anger over the US policy. But it’s not easy to do so because there is no doubt that the USA has sufficient levers to influence its European partners.

US fugitive Snowden applies for political asylum in Russia - Sheremetyevo official

Former CIA officer Edward Snowden has applied for political asylum in Russia, claimed Kim Shevchenko, the official consul-on-duty at Sheremetyevo airport.

"Yesterday around 10:30 pm the British citizen Sarah Harrison, who introduced herself as a lawyer and confidant of U.S. citizen Edward Snowden, passed the Russian Foreign Ministry consular office at Sheremetyevo airport Mr Snowden's application for political asylum in Russia," Shevchenko said.

According to the Russian diplomat, he took the documents, contacted Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and later passed the documents to the Ministry.

Snowden can stay only if he stops harming 'our American partners' - Putin

President Vladimir Putin said on Monday that Russia would not hand former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden over to the United States but that if Snowden wants to stay in Russia he "must stop his work aimed at harming our American partners".

"There is one condition if he wants to remain here: he must stop his work aimed at damaging our American partners. As odd as it may sound from me,” Putin told a media conference in Moscow.

However, Russia is not going to extradite Snowden, the president underlined.

"Russia has never extradited anyone and is not going to do so. Same as no one has ever been extradited to Russia,” Putin stated.

"At best,” he noted, Russia exchanged its foreign intelligence employees detained abroad for "those who were detained, arrested and sentenced by a court in the Russian Federation.”

Snowden "is not a Russian agent", the president said, repeating that Russian intelligence services were not working with the fugitive American.

He said Snowden should choose his final destination and go there.

Putin also added that if Snowden considered himself a rights activist, a "new dissident”, he can be compared to Nobel Peace Prize winner Andrei Sakharov.

Putin wouldn’t say if any of the leaders of gas exporting nations attending a summit in Moscow could offer Snowden shelter.

The former CIA employee Snowden, who is behind the biggest leak in the NSA, has been stuck in the transit zone of Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport for over a week now, after he arrived in the Russian capital from Hong Kong.

The US annulled the whistleblower’s American passport and he presently has no other documents with which he can travel.

Snowden asking 15 countries for asylum

Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor who leaked U.S. security secrets and is now a fugitive, met Monday morning with Russian diplomatic officials and handed them an appeal to 15 countries for political asylum, LA Times reports.

According to LA Times, it was a desperate measure on his part after Ecuador disavowed his political protection credentials.

In the document Snowden reiterated once again that he is not a traitor and explained his actions only by a desire to open the world’s eyes on the flagrant violations by U.S. special services not only of American citizens but also citizens of European Union including their NATO allies.

Snowden will continue disclosures - Julian Assange

The former NSA contractor Edward Snowden will reveal the remaining secret information on spy services’ activities in the nearest future and will continue doing this, said Wikileaks founder Julian Assange.

"There is no stopping the publishing process at this stage”, - the founder of Wikileaks said in an interview to ABC Channel reporters at the Ecuador Embassy in London where Assange is granted asylum in order not to be extradited to Sweden for sexual crime.

"Great care has been taken to make sure Mr Snowden cannot be pressured by any state to stop the publishing process", - Julian Assange stated.

According to Assange, publication of information concerning government and spy services does not endanger human lives as they say in the US.

"We discussed the damage issue, however, neither American politicians nor any government in the world reported about any physical harm done by our publications during the six years of Wikileaks’ existence. " And the information Snowden got was even more vague (than the data revealed by Wikileaks)", - Assange added .

As it was reported earlier, in May Snowden left the US for Hong Kong and after that revealed the secret information on Internet spying services. Due to Snowden’s leak it became public, in particular, that American spy services got access to million people’s phone calls information and, what is more, to the largest internet-companies’ servers.

Snowden then flew to Moscow where, according to the mass media reports, he is staying currently – in the Sheremetyevo airport transit zone. The US urge Russian Federation to extradite the NSA ex-contractor back to the States.

Ecuador's Correa says Snowden's fate in hands of Russia

Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa said on Sunday the fate of former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden is in the hands of the authorities in Russia, where he is holed up in hope of obtaining asylum in the South American nation.

Correa said his government cannot begin considering asylum for Snowden, wanted by Washington for leaking confidential information about a surveillance program, until he reaches Ecuador or an Ecuadorean embassy.

The 30-year-old former National Security Agency contractor has not been able to leave the Moscow international airport.

"It's up to the Russian authorities if he can leave the Moscow airport for an Ecuadorean embassy," Correa said in an interview with Reuters in the coastal city of Portoviejo.

"He will be treated just like any other citizen even though he does not have a passport. We are clear that this is a special situation."

Correa said WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, granted asylum last year in Ecuador's London embassy, has not lost the country's support despite contributing to confusion over a travel document issued to Snowden by Ecuador's government.

"In these crises when there is need to respond with urgency, it's also possible to make mistakes, but Mr. Assange continues to enjoy our support, respect and appreciation," he said.

Correa said he sent his best regards to Snowden and told him to "keep his spirits high" as he seeks to escape his limbo.

Pushkov calls Snowden expulsion from Russia immoral

Alexei Pushkov, the head of the State Duma committee on international affairs, has expressed the opinion that Russia's expulsion of former CIA employee Edward Snowden to the United States is impermissible, primarily for moral reasons.

"How Snowden can be useful to Russia is a question in the spirit of Smerdyakov [a character from Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel "The Brothers Karamazov"]. Not usefulness is in question, but principle. The expulsion of a political refugee is morally impermissible," Pushkov twitted on Sunday.

Earlier Pushkov called Snowden a dissident.

"Assange, Manning and Snowden were not spies and released secret information because of their convictions, not for money. They are new dissidents, fighters against the system," Pushkov said on Twitter on Wednesday.

Julian Assange, the founder WikiLeaks, has been hiding on the territory of the embassy of Ecuador in London for over a year. U.S. Private Bradley Manning was arrested in May 2010 on suspicion of having provided to WikiLeaks a scandalous video of an attack on Reuter's journalists from a helicopter, which occurred near Bagdad in 2007

Snowden, who provided to the press information on secret surveillance programs of the U.S. special services, earlier asked for political asylum in Ecuador.

Snowden left the U.S. for Hong Kong in May and arrived in Moscow last Sunday.

Russian President Vladimir Putin says Snowden remains in the transit zone of the Moscow Sheremetyevo airport.

The U.S. demands that Russia extradite Snowden. The Russian authorities allege that he has not crossed the Russian border and therefore is not on the territory of Russia.

You can read all materials about Edward Snowden here