Snowden seeks asylum in Russia
Former US spy agency contractor Edward Snowden has applied for political asylum in Russia, a Russian official said on Monday, but President Vladimir Putin said he was not welcome unless he stopped harming US interests "as strange as that sounds coming from my lips".
Wikileaks activist Sarah Harrison, who is travelling with Snowden, handed his application to a Russian consular official in the transit area at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport late on Sunday, Kim Shevchenko, a consul at the airport, told Reuters.
The Los Angeles Times, citing an unidentified Russian Foreign Ministry official, reported that Snowden had met Russian diplomats and given them a list of 15 countries where he wished to apply for asylum. Foreign Ministry and Kremlin officials declined immediate comment on the reports. Putin, speaking eight days after Snowden arrived at a Moscow airport where he is believed to remain, repeated that Russia had no intention of handing him over to the United States, where he faces espionage charges.
