GENEVA: Edward Snow­den has made a public appeal for Switzerland to grant him asylum, saying he would like to return to live in Geneva, where he once worked undercover for the Central Intelligence Agency.

The fugitive former US spy agency contractor, wanted by Washington for leaking details of US mass surveillance programmes, spoke from Moscow by video link to a Geneva audience after a viewing of “Citizen­four”, an Oscar-winning documentary about his case.

“I would love to return to Switzerland, some of my favourite memories are from Geneva. It’s a wonderful place,” he told the Inter­natio­ nal Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights on Thurs­day night, where he was asked about seeking asylum.

“I do think Switzerland would be a sort of great political option because it has a history of neutrality,” he said, praising its multicultural diversity and human rights record.

Snowden said he had appealed to 21 countries, “the majority in central and Western Europe”, for asylum after the United States cancelled his passport and he was stopped from going to Ecuador.

Published in Dawn March 7th , 2015

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