France and Mexico Monday angrily demanded swift explanations about fresh leaks by former US security contractor Edward Snowden, which alleged that the United States had spied on millions of phone communications. French daily Le Monde reported that the US National Security Agency (NSA) secretly monitored 70.3 million phone communications in France over a 30-day period from December 10, 2012, to January 8.
German magazine Der Speigel said the NSA had hacked into former Mexican president Felipe Calderon's email account. The allegations come on top of revelations already leaked by Snowden - who has sought refuge in Russia as the US seeks to try him for leaking classified information - and published in June that the US had a vast, secret programme called PRISM to monitor Internet users.
French prosecutors are already investigating the programme, and French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said he was "deeply shocked" by the new revelations. "It's incredible that an allied country like the United States at this point goes as far as spying on private communications that have no strategic justification, no justification on the basis of national defence," he told journalists. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, on a visit to Luxembourg, said US ambassador Charles Rivkin was summoned to his ministry early Monday.
"These kinds of practices between partners that harm privacy are totally unacceptable," he told reporters, adding France needed assurances that the United States was no longer monitoring its communications. His comments were relayed to the US ambassador during the meeting, a ministry spokesman said - the second time in less than four months that America's top representative in France has been hauled in over revelations about US snooping.
Review to balance security and privacy. The latest leak could prove embarrassing for US Secretary of State John Kerry, who arrived in Paris Monday for talks with Arab officials. Fabius will raise the issue with him in talks Tuesday morning, the spokesman said. And a State Department official said Kerry would have "discussions with the French." The White House and the NSA however brushed off the complaints, saying "all nations" conduct spying operations.
"As a matter of policy, we have made clear that the United States gathers foreign intelligence of the type gathered by all nations," said statements from National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden and the NSA. The administration of President Barack Obama was now beginning "to review the way that we gather intelligence, so that we properly balance the legitimate security concerns of our citizens and allies with the privacy concerns that all people share" the two statements added According to Le Monde, the spy agency automatically picked up communications from certain phone numbers in France and recorded certain text messages under a programme code-named "US-985D".
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