BERLIN - The German government said Wednesday that it had received information that the cellphone of Chancellor Angela Merkel was under surveillance by U.S. intelligence services, and that she had called President Barack Obama to make clear that such practices - if confirmed - were “completely unacceptable.”
Steffen Seibert, the chancellor’s spokesman, quoted Merkel as telling Obama: “Between close friends and partners, which the Federal Republic of Germany and the United States of America have been for decades, there should be no such surveillance of the communications of a head of government.”
He further quoted her as telling Obama: “That would be a grave breach of trust. Such practices must cease immediately.”
It was the second time in three days that allegations of U.S. government surveillance threatened to cloud relations between Washington and close European allies. The consternation in Berlin followed a furor in France over reports in Le Monde newspaper that U.S. intelligence had collected data on 70 million communications by French citizens in a 30-day period late last year and into January.
The White House issued a statement confirming that Obama and Merkel had spoken “regarding allegations that the U.S. National Security Agency intercepted the communications of the German Chancellor. The president assured the Chancellor that the United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of Chancellor Merkel.”
The statement did not address whether those communications had been intercepted in the past.
Also on Wednesday, James Clapper, the U.S. director of national intelligence, disputed some details of Le Monde’s reports as misleading.
The French criticism of the U.S. after the report was published - Ambassador Charles Rivkin was summoned Monday to the French Foreign Ministry - followed unhappiness expressed by Germany in June and since then by Brazil and Mexico about having been targeted by the National Security Agency’s surveillance program. Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff canceled a visit to the U.S. over the issue.
Like earlier allegations of widespread surveillance in Germany, the disclosures in France were based on documents provided by Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who has been charged in the U.S. with espionage and theft. His leaks of agency materials have pointed an uncomfortable spotlight on the scope of U.S. spying at home and abroad.
Snowden, who has been granted asylum in Russia, has been both denounced as a traitor and lauded as a hero for exposing the perils of government spying on private citizens in the digital age.
The statement from Seibert did not make clear what information the German government had received. Der Spiegel newsmagazine said on its website that it had made an inquiry to the government in the course of routine research, and said that inquiry had triggered the reaction.
“Apparently, after an examination by the Federal Intelligence Service and the Federal Office for Security in Information Technology the government found sufficient plausible grounds to confront the U.S. government,” the magazine said.
In France, President Francois Hollande expressed “extreme reprobation” after the revelations of surveillance of French citizens. The White House official said Obama called Hollande on Monday and acknowledged that some of the reports had raised “legitimate questions for our friends and allies.”
“The president and President Hollande discussed recent disclosures in the press - some of which have distorted our activities, and some of which raise legitimate questions for our friends and allies about how these capabilities are employed,” the White House said in a statement.
In late June, after reports in Der Spiegel that the United States had been spying on the European Union and that the National Security Agency had tapped its offices in Washington, Brussels and the United Nations, European politicians expressed anger and demanded an explanation.
The White House statement issued Wednesday stressed that “the United States greatly values our close cooperation with Germany on a broad range of shared security challenges. As the President has said, the United States is reviewing the way that we gather intelligence to ensure that we properly balance the security concerns of our citizens and allies with the privacy concerns that all people share.”
The leaders agreed “to intensify further the cooperation between our intelligence services with the goal of protecting the security of both countries and of our partners, as well as protecting the privacy of our citizens,” the statement added.
The need to issue two statements in 48 hours over relations with close trans-Atlantic allies underscored the damage wrought by the documents Snowden said he collected while working for U.S. intelligence agencies.
In a statement published Wednesday on the website of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Clapper raised objections to Le Monde’s reporting, saying recent articles “contain inaccurate and misleading information regarding U.S. foreign intelligence activities.”
In the statement, first reported by The Associated Press late Tuesday, Clapper did not address additional allegations in Le Monde that the National Security Agency had monitored “French diplomatic interests” at the United Nations and in Washington.
The newspaper reported that confidential information garnered by the agency from eavesdropping had played a “big role” in securing a vote at the U.N. on June 9, 2010, in favor of a resolution imposing sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program.
If U.S. intelligence agencies were listening to Merkel’s phone, or registering what calls she made and received, the trust between Berlin and Washington could be severely damaged. Since Der Spiegel’s original revelations in June, even senior officials in the German government have voiced more caution about cooperating with the United States.
In July, Merkel signaled that she understood the importance - for all Western allies - of collecting intelligence. But she also emphasized that German or European laws should not be violated, and one needed to ensure that it was the rule of law and not of the strong that guided allied actions.
The alarm of Americans - and indeed their allies - after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks was understandable, Merkel said then, but “the aim does not justify the means. Not everything which is technically do-able, should be done. The question of relative means must always be answered: What relation is there between the danger and the means we choose, also and especially with regard to preserving the basic rights contained in our basic law?”
Two senior U.S. administration officials were visiting Berlin on Wednesday as part of the ongoing exchange on intelligence and other matters, in particular the trans-Atlantic trade negotiations that both the U.S. and the European Union portray as a pillar for future relations.
The latest round of talks was canceled earlier this month because of the U.S. government shutdown.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 10/24/2013