Presidents Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua and Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela said today they were willing to grant asylum to US intelligence whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Former National Security Agency employee Mr Snowden has asked for asylum in several countries, including Nicaragua and Venezuela.

"As head of state, the government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela decided to offer humanitarian asylum to the young American Edward Snowden so that he can live (without) ... persecution from the empire," Mr Maduro said, referring to the United States.

He made the offer during a speech marking the anniversary of Venezuela's independence. It was not immediately clear if there were any conditions to the offer.

In Nicaragua, Mr Ortega said he was willing to make the same offer "if circumstances allow it". Mr Ortega did not say what the right circumstances would be when he spoke during a speech in Managua.

He said the Nicaraguan embassy in Moscow received Mr Snowden's application for asylum and that it was studying the request.

"We have the sovereign right to help a person who felt remorse after finding out how the United States was using technology to spy on the whole world, and especially its European allies," Mr Ortega said.

The offers followed a flap about the re-routing of Bolivian president Evo Morales' plane in Europe earlier this week amid reports that Mr Snowden might have been aboard.

Spain said on Friday it had been warned along with other European countries that Mr Snowden was aboard the Bolivian presidential plane, an acknowledgement that the manhunt for the fugitive leaker had something to do with the plane's unexpected diversion to Austria.

It is unclear whether the United States, which has told its European allies that it wants Mr Snowden back, warned Madrid about the Bolivian president's plane. US officials will not detail their conversations with European countries, except to say that they have stated the US's general position that it wants Mr Snowden back.

President Barack Obama has publicly displayed a relaxed attitude towards Mr Snowden's movements, saying last month that he would not be "scrambling jets to get a 29-year-old hacker".

But the drama surrounding the flight of Mr Morales, whose plane was abruptly rerouted to Vienna after apparently being denied permission to fly over France, suggests that pressure is being applied behind the scenes.

Spanish foreign minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo told Spanish National Television that "they told us that the information was clear, that he was inside".

He did not identify who "they" were and declined to say whether he had been in contact with the US. But he said that European countries' decisions were based on the tip. France has since sent a letter of apology to the Bolivian government.

Meanwhile, secret-spilling website WikiLeaks said that Mr Snowden, who is still believed to be stuck in a Moscow airport's transit area, had put in asylum applications to six new countries. He had already sought asylum from more than 20 countries, many of which turned him down.

WikiLeaks said in a message posted to Twitter on Friday that it would not be identifying the countries involved "due to attempted US interference".

Icelandic MPs introduced a proposal in parliament on Thursday to grant immediate citizenship to Mr Snowden, but the idea received minimal support.

Later Bolivian President Mr Morales also said Mr Snowden is welcome in his country. He said he is making the offer as a protest against the US and European nations he accuses of temporarily blocking his flight home from a Moscow summit because they suspected his might have Mr Snowden on board.

Mr Morales earlier said he was willing to consider asylum for Mr Snowden, the same position taken by Ecuador, which is another of Bolivia's leftist Latin American allies.

Mr Morales says he has not yet received a formal petition for asylum from Snowden.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.