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Snowden and NSA leaks

France to consider Snowden’s request for asylum in case of application

Nonetheless, French authorities haven't received any request from ex-CIA agent yet

Photo EPA/ITAR-TASS

Photo EPA/ITAR-TASS

PARIS, July 4. /ITAR-TASS reporter Ilya Baranov/. Paris has not yet received request for asylum from former NSA and CIA employee Edward Snowden. This was announced today by the Minister of Internal Affairs of France, Manuel Valls cited by the BFM TV channel.

"Snowden hasn’t asked for asylum. France has not received such a request. If he will file a request, then we will have to pay attention to it. I myself don’t support this decision very much. The matter is extremely complex. This is an agent of U.S. intelligence, and the U.S. is not a dictatorship. However, for legal reasons, this case is very confusing," said the head of the Interior Ministry.

The representatives of a number of states, the authorities of which Edward Snowden has asked for political asylum, have made official statements. Some of them directly denied the petition /Brazil, Germany, India, Poland and Finland/, others referred to the provisions in the national legislation, under which asylum may be granted only to persons that are already in their territory /Austria, Ireland, Iceland, Spain, Norway, Switzerland and Ecuador/. Venezuela and Bolivia expressed their support to Snowden, promising to consider a request for political asylum if such is received.

A few weeks ago, Edward Snowden has declassified information about the program PRISM, by means of which the NSA has collected data on Internet traffic customers of the largest Internet providers. The published documents revealed that the United States were thus watching over representatives of EU countries. This information caused a sharp reaction from European politicians.

30-year-old Snowden started revelations in Hong Kong, from where he flew to Moscow on June 23. The next day he was supposed to go from the Russian capital to Cuba, but he hasn’t stepped aboard the plane. The American is still in the transit area of the airport Sheremetyevo.

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Blinken’s visit to China meant to shatter Russian-Chinese ties — senior Russian diplomat

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