Snowden has formally requested a temporary asylum in Russia

Former U.S. intelligence consultant Edward Snowden, blocked for more than three weeks in a Moscow airport on Tuesday urged a temporary asylum in Russia, told AFP the Russian lawyer Anatoly Koutcherena, who is in contact with him.

"The request was sent to the Russian authorities," said the lawyer, member of the Public Chamber, an advisory body close to Kremlin , stating that it had been given to a representative of the Migration Service.

"I just left" Edward Snowden at the airport in Moscow-Sheremetyevo, added the lawyer who had already met last Friday with the computer scientist.

That day, at a meeting held at the airport with 13 Russian personalities, including Mr. Koutcherena,Snowden had announced his intention to seek political asylum in Russia, waiting to go to America Latin America, where Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua were willing to accept him.

But since the Russian authorities had indicated that they had received yet a formal request from him."We do not comment on this yet," said Tuesday a member of the Migration Service to Interfax.