Bolivian officials insist that the United States “ordered” the European states to deny flyover rights to Mr Morales’s plane because it hoped to nab Mr Snowden. On arriving in La Paz late on Wednesday, the president said: “It is an open provocation to the continent, not only to the president; they use the agent of North American imperialism to scare us and intimidate us.” Officials in Paris said that French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius had called his Bolivian counterpart to express regret over the “late confirmation” of flyover rights.