NSA leaker Edward Snowden's attempts to seek refuge outside the United States hit hurdles Tuesday, after Russian media reported he canceled his asylum bid in Russia and several European countries said such applications wouldn't be considered if they were made from abroad. 
 
 FILE - This June 23, 2013 file photo shows a TV screen shows a news report of Edward Snowden, a former CIA employee who leaked top-secret documents about sweeping U.S. surveillance programs, at a shopping... (Associated Press) 
 
 This screenshot made of the Wikileaks website shows a letter identified as being from NSA leaker Edward Snowden on Monday, July 1, 2013. The letter could not be independently authenticated as being from... (Associated Press) 
 
 Russian news agencies Tuesday quoted President Vladimir Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying that Snowden withdrew his request when he learnt about the terms Moscow has set out. Putin said on Monday that Russia is ready to shelter Snowden as long as he stops leaking U.S. secrets. 
 
 At the same time, Putin said he had no plans to turn over Snowden to the United States. 
 
 Meanwhile several of the other countries where the WikiLeaks says Snowden has applied for asylum have said he cannot apply from abroad. Officials in Germany, Norway, Austria, Poland, Finland and Switzerland all said he must make his request on their soil. 
 
 WikiLeaks said requests have also been made to Bolivia, Brazil, China, Cuba, Ecuador, France, Iceland, India, Italy, Ireland, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Spain and Venezuela. 
 
 The asylum requests reported by WikiLeaks and the Snowden statement could not be independently authenticated. 
 
 WikiLeaks also posted a statement attributed to Snowden on its website late Monday, in which he slams President Barack Obama for "using citizenship as a weapon." 
 
 "Although I am convicted of nothing, (the United States) has unilaterally revoked my passport, leaving me a stateless person," Snowden says in the statement. "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." 
 
 Snowden, who has been on the run since releasing sensitive NSA documents, is believed to have been in Moscow airport's transit zone since his arrival from Hong Kong on June 23. 
 
 WikiLeaks legal adviser Sarah Harrison delivered the requests for asylum to an official at the Russian consulate at the Moscow airport on Sunday, according to the group that has adopted Snowden and his cause. 
 
 The U.S. has annulled Snowden's passport, and Ecuador, where he had initially hoped to get asylum, has been giving mixed signals about offering him shelter. 
 
 The expanded requests for asylum come as the Obama administration contends with European allies angry about the release of documents that alleged U.S. eavesdropping on European Union diplomats. 
 
 Obama said Monday that the U.S. would provide allies with information about new reports that the NSA had bugged EU offices in Washington, New York and Brussels. But he also suggested such activity by governments would hardly be unusual. ||||| Image caption Edward Snowden is believed to be staying at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport 
 
 Fugitive US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden has sent asylum requests to 21 countries, according to a statement published by Wikileaks. 
 
 They include China, France, Ireland and Venezuela. But eight European countries said the requests were invalid. 
 
 And Russia said Mr Snowden later withdrew the application to Moscow as the Kremlin had set conditions. 
 
 He accuses US President Barack Obama of putting pressure on the countries to which he has applied. 
 
 The former intelligence systems analyst, who is holed up at Moscow airport, is wanted by the US on charges of leaking secrets. 
 
 Analysis Vladimir Putin's warning to Mr Snowden that he should stop "harming our American partners" is indicative of a significant shifting of gear. Russia now has ownership of the Snowden affair. What happens to Mr Snowden will depend upon Russia's calculations and what serves Russia's interests. The authorities in Moscow could have moved Mr Snowden on quickly, joining the diplomatic game of pass-the-parcel that began in Hong Kong. But the longer the errant US intelligence analyst stays in limbo at the Moscow airport, so the more Russia has become a central actor in this drama. Russia must balance a range of factors in seeking to determine Mr Snowden's fate - the risk of a serious rift with Washington and Russia's own standing as an international actor that upholds the legal order must be set against the strong vein of sympathy for Mr Snowden amongst Russian public opinion. 
 
 US Secretary of State John Kerry raised Mr Snowden's case in talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on the sidelines of the Asean summit in Brunei. 
 
 But Mr Kerry said the two did not discuss the matter substantively. 
 
 "I did raise the issue of Mr Snowden but that is not his portfolio, nor is it mine, but it is being handled within the justice department," he said, quoted by Reuters news agency. 
 
 'Not an agent' 
 
 The Wikileaks press release said that most of the asylum requests - including to Russia itself - were handed to the Russian consulate at Sheremetyevo airport late on Sunday for delivery to the relevant embassies in Moscow. 
 
 The requests were submitted by Sarah Harrison, a British member of the Wikileaks legal team acting as Mr Snowden's representative, the statement added. 
 
 But Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov later said Mr Snowden withdrew the application to Russia because Moscow had said he should give up "anti-American activity". 
 
 "After learning of Russia's position yesterday, voiced by President Putin ... he abandoned his intention [of staying] and his request to be able to stay in Russia," he said. 
 
 Russian President Vladimir Putin had said that while Moscow "never hands over anybody anywhere", Mr Snowden could only stay on condition that he stopped damaging Russia's "American partners" with his leaks. 
 
 Mr Snowden has reportedly been in the transit area of Sheremetyevo since arriving there from Hong Kong on 23 June. 
 
 Mr Peskov confirmed he was still there and had not crossed into Russian territory, adding that the former analyst had never been a Russian agent and had never worked with its intelligence services. 
 
 Norway, Poland, Germany, Austria, Finland, Ireland, Spain and Switzerland said asylum requests could only be made on their soil. 
 
 Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who is on a visit to Moscow, said Caracas had not yet received an asylum application from Mr Snowden but that he had "done something very important for humanity" and "deserved the world's protection". 
 
 "The world's conscience should react, the world youth should react, the decent people who want a peaceful world should react, everyone should react and find solidarity with this young man who has denounced and altered the world that they [the US] pretend to control." 
 
 Mr Snowden had previously submitted an application to Ecuador, whose embassy in London is sheltering Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, and to Iceland. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Vladimir Putin: "He should cease his work aimed at damaging our American partners" 
 
 Ecuador's President Rafael Correa told the Agence France-Presse news agency on Monday that his country would process Mr Snowden's asylum request if he managed to enter an Ecuadorean embassy. 
 
 However, if he can complete his asylum request on Russian territory , then "the situation can be processed and resolved there," President Correa added. 
 
 Details have also emerged of a letter from Mr Snowden to President Correa, thanking Ecuador for guaranteeing "my rights would be protected upon departing Hong Kong - I could never have risked travel without that". 
 
 'Stateless person' 
 
 Speaking in Tanzania on Monday, President Barack Obama said Moscow and Washington had held "high level discussions" about Mr Snowden, who he said had travelled to Moscow without valid documents. 
 
 Mr Snowden describes himself as "a stateless person", accusing the US government of stopping him from exercising the "basic right...to seek asylum". 
 
 "The president ordered his vice president to pressure the leaders of nations from which I have requested protection to deny my asylum petitions," he is quoted by Wikileaks as saying. 
 
 "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." 
 
 The leaking of thousands of classified intelligence documents has led to revelations that the US is systematically seizing vast amounts of phone and web data. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The presidents of Venezuela and Nicaragua explain their offers 
 
 The presidents of Nicaragua, Venezuela and Bolivia have indicated their countries could offer political asylum to US fugitive Edward Snowden. 
 
 Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro said it would give asylum to the intelligence leaker, who is believed to be holed up in a transit area of Moscow airport. 
 
 Meanwhile Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega said his country would do so "if circumstances permit". 
 
 Bolivia's Evo Morales said Mr Snowden could get asylum there if he sought it. 
 
 Mr Snowden has sent requests for political asylum to at least 21 countries, most of which have turned down his request. Earlier, Wikileaks said he had applied to six additional countries on Friday. 
 
 The whistleblowing website said it would not name the countries "due to attempted US interference". 
 
 But even if a country accepted the American's application, getting there could prove difficult, the BBC's Steven Rosenberg, in Moscow, reports. 
 
 European airspace could be closed to any aircraft suspected of carrying the fugitive, our correspondent says. 
 
 Earlier this week, several European countries reportedly refused to allow the Bolivian president's jet to cross their airspace on its way back from Moscow - apparently because of suspicions that Edward Snowden was on board. 
 
 Mr Morales described Mr Snowden's actions as "a fair way of protesting" and described him as "persecuted by his fellow countrymen". 
 
 "We are not scared [of reprisals]," he added. 
 
 Speculation 
 
 President Maduro made his announcement in a speech on Venezuela's Independence Day. 
 
 "As head of state and government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela I have decided to offer humanitarian asylum to the young US citizen Edward Snowden so he can come to the fatherland of Bolivar and Chavez to live away from the imperial North American persecution," President Maduro said. 
 
 The US wants to prosecute Mr Snowden over the leaking of thousands of classified intelligence documents. 
 
 Earlier Mr Ortega said Nicaragua had received an application at its embassy in Moscow. 
 
 "We are open, respectful of the right to asylum, and it is clear that if circumstances permit it, we would receive Snowden with pleasure and give him asylum here in Nicaragua," AFP news agency quoted the Nicaraguan president as saying. 
 
 Image caption President Ortega said the asylum application was received in Moscow 
 
 Daniel Ortega was a fierce opponent of the US during his first period as Nicaragua's president in the 1980s, after the left-wing Sandinista movement came to power. 
 
 Bolivia, which had also suggested it could offer Mr Snowden asylum, saw its presidential plane barred from European airspace on Tuesday. 
 
 There was speculation the 30-year-old was on the plane carrying President Evo Morales back from Russia to La Paz earlier this week. 
 
 "Edward Snowden has applied to another six countries for asylum," tweeted Wikileaks, which has been helping the former CIA contractor. 
 
 "They will not be named at this time due to attempted US interference." 
 
 The US has been blamed for being behind the decision by France, Portugal, Italy and Spain to close its airspace to Bolivia's president, whose plane was grounded in Austria for 13 hours as a result. 
 
 Earlier on Friday, Spain's Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo admitted he and other European officials had been told that Mr Snowden was on board - but refused to say who gave out the information. 
 
 He denied Spain had closed its airspace to the presidential plane, explaining that the delay in Austria meant the flight permit had expired and needed to be renewed. 
 
 His comment is the first official recognition by the European states that the incident with Mr Morales' plane was connected with the Snowden affair. 
 
 It has been widely condemned by President Morales and several other South American nations, who were critical of the US. 
 
 Mr Snowden arrived in the Moscow airport from Hong Kong last month. 
 
 He revealed himself to be responsible for the leaking of classified US intelligence documents that revealed a vast surveillance programme of phone and web data. 
 
 The documents have also led to allegations that both the UK and French intelligence agencies run similarly vast data collection operations, and the US has been eavesdropping on official EU communications.
– Can Edward Snowden afford to be choosy? Authorities in Russia say the NSA leaker has reportedly canceled a request for asylum after balking at the conditions imposed by Vladimir Putin, including no longer leaking information damaging to the US, the AP reports. Snowden has applied for asylum in no fewer than 21 countries, according to WikiLeaks, but the rejections are starting to pile up: Germany, Norway, Austria, Poland, Finland, and Switzerland all say he needs to be on their soil to request asylum. And India this morning "concluded that we see no reason to accede to that request." Norway has confirmed that its Moscow embassy has received a fax that is "probably from him," while Poland's foreign minister says he has received an asylum request from Snowden that he will not recommend granting, the BBC reports. Requests have also been made to Bolivia, Brazil, China, Cuba, Ecuador, France, Iceland, Italy, Ireland, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Spain, and Venezuela, WikiLeaks says. Ecuador's president now says helping Snowden leave Hong Kong was "a mistake," the Guardian reports, but Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro—who is currently visiting Moscow—says his country has yet to receive an asylum request from Snowden, but the leaker has "done something very important for humanity" and "deserved the world's protection."