Defence Department secretary Dennis Richardson says fugitive US defence contractor Edward Snowden should be regarded as a common criminal, not a whistleblower.
Mr Richardson, the former head of the Australian Security intelligence Organisation (ASIO), said he became irritated every time he saw a reference to Snowden's disclosure of US intelligence information as whistleblowing.
"I thought whistleblowers revealed things that were illegal," he told an Australian Strategic Policy Institute dinner in Canberra on Tuesday.
"As far as I am concerned Snowden is probably nothing more than a garden-variety criminal."
Mr Snowden, a former US defence contractor, revealed details of secret US surveillance programs that were later published worldwide. He's currently in hiding in Russia, where he has been granted asylum for a year.
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