The head of the National Security Agency said on Sunday he did not know why his agency failed to prevent former NSA contractor Edward Snowden from leaving Hawaii for Hong Kong with a trove of secrets about U.S. surveillance programs.
_0">"It's clearly an individual who's betrayed the trust and confidence we had in him. This is an individual who is not acting, in my opinion, with noble intent," General Keith Alexander told the ABC News "This Week" program.
Snowden had been working as a contractor for the NSA in Hawaii when he fled to Hong Kong and he flew to Moscow on Sunday.
Asked if he knew why the NSA did not catch Snowden before he left Hawaii, Alexander said: "No, I don't."
(Reporting by Paul Eckert; Editing by Bill Trott)