US Spied on Merkel, Other Europeans Through Danish Cables, Broadcaster DR Alleges
Reuters
May 31, 2021
COPENHAGEN, DENMARK - The U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) used a partnership with Denmark's foreign intelligence unit to spy on senior officials of neighboring countries, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Danish state broadcaster DR said.
The findings are the result of a 2015 internal investigation in the
Danish Defense Intelligence Service into NSA's role in the partnership,
DR said, citing nine unnamed sources with access to the investigation.
According to the investigation, which covered the period from 2012 to
2014, the NSA used Danish information cables to spy on senior officials
in Sweden, Norway, France and Germany, including former German Foreign
Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and former German opposition leader
Peer Steinbruck.
Asked for comment on the DR report, a spokesperson for the German
chancellery said it only became aware of the allegations when asked
about them by journalists and declined to comment further.
Danish Defense Minister Trine Bramsen declined to comment on
"speculation" about intelligence matters in the media. "I can more
generally say that this government has the same attitude as the former
Prime Minister expressed in 2013 and 2014 - systematic wiretapping of
close allies is unacceptable," Bramsen told Reuters in a statement.
In Washington, the NSA and the Office of the Director of National
Intelligence (DNI) declined to comment. A spokesperson for the Danish
Defense Intelligence Service also declined to comment.
Denmark, a close ally of the United States, hosts several key landing
stations for subsea internet cables to and from Sweden, Norway, Germany,
Holland and Britain.
Through targeted retrievals and the use of NSA-developed analysis
software known as Xkeyscore, NSA intercepted both calls, texts and chat
messages to and from telephones of officials in the neighboring
countries, sources told DR.
The internal investigation in the Danish Defense Intelligence Service
was launched in 2014 following concerns about former NSA employee Edward
Snowden's leaks the previous year revealing how the NSA works,
according to DR.
Snowden fled the United States after leaking secret NSA files in 2013 and was given asylum in Russia.
Following DR's report, Snowden posted a cryptic Danish-language comment
on Twitter saying: "If only there had been some reason to investigate
many years ago. Oh why didn't anyone warn us?"
Steinbruck told German broadcaster ARD he thought it was "grotesque that
friendly intelligence services are indeed intercepting and spying on
top representatives" of other countries.
"Politically I consider it a scandal," he said.
Swedish Defense Minister Peter Hultqvist told Swedish SVT broadcaster
that he "demanded full information". Norwegian Defense Minister Frank
Bakke-Jensen told broadcaster NRK that he took the allegations
seriously.
In Paris, French Minister for European Affairs Clement Beaune told
France Info radio that the DR report needed to be checked and that, if
confirmed, it would be a "serious" matter.
"These potential facts, they are serious, they must be checked," he said, adding there could be "some diplomatic protests."
A decision in August last year to suspend the head of the Danish Defense
Intelligence Service and three other officials following criticism and
accusations of serious wrongdoings from an independent board overseeing
the agency centered on the 2015 investigation, according to DR.
Denmark said last year it would initiate an investigation into the case based on information from a whistleblower report.
That investigation is expected to be concluded later this year.
1 comment:
Everybody spies on everybody. We probably spy on Canada. Canada probably spies on us.
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