I wouldn't have sent Anna Chapman back, jokes Joe Biden on US television

The international spy exchange between the US and Russia was a good deal — even if America had to wave goodbye to red-haired tabloid favourite Anna Chapman, the US vice-president, Joe Biden, quipped on a late-night television chat show. A dual British and Russian citizen, 28-year-old Chapman has garnered the most attention of any of the 10 Russian agents rounded up by the US authorities. Holding up a picture of her, comedian Jay Leno asked the vice-president: "Do we have any spies that hot?" Biden joked that he would rather have dispatched the rightwing polemicist Rush Limbaugh to Russia: "Let me be clear. It wasn't my idea to send her back. I thought maybe they'd take Rush Limbaugh or something. That would've been a good move." Chapman and nine other secret Russian agents were swapped for four western intelligence officers released by Moscow on Friday. Biden drew laughs by suggesting that although the numbers were uneven, the deal was fair. "We got back four really good ones," he told Leno. "And the 10, they've been here a long time, but they haven't done much."