The National Security Agency monitored the phone calls of at least 35 world leaders, The Guardian reported Thursday.
The latest bombshell disclosure courtesy of ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden added more tension to already-strained diplomatic relations with key American allies like Germany and also implicated senior government officials in the spying.
A confidential NSA memo from 2006 notes the surveillance of unspecified foreign leaders resulted in “little reportable intelligence” but did point to other phone numbers that were then flagged for monitoring, the newspaper reported.
The NSA, according to the document, seeks access to the “Rolodexes” of senior staffers at other government departments like the White House, State Department and Pentagon.
The contact info gives the agency a bounty of new communications to monitor.
The NSA memo, written during the George W. Bush administration, cites one example in which “a U.S. official provided NSA with 200 phone numbers to 35 world leaders.”
The stunning surveillance revelation dominated a gathering of the European Union Thursday in Brussels, as numerous leaders said their faith in President Obama had been shaken.
Surveillance of allied leaders, many noted, meant the NSA was not monitoring foreign communications for the sole purpose of preventing terrorism or other matters of national security, as it has claimed.
“We need trust among allies and partners,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said. “Such trust now has to be built anew.”
Prior to the latest disclosure, Merkel had expressed outrage after reports surfaced Wednesday that the NSA had tapped her cell phone.
“The United States of America and Europe face common challenges. We are allies,” she said.
“But such an alliance can only be built on trust. That’s why I repeat again: Spying among friends, that cannot be.”
The White House said the NSA isn’t monitoring Merkel’s communications — but notably didn’t address whether it had done so in the past.
Merkel was far from the only fuming head of state Thursday.
Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt called the spying on allied leaders “completely unacceptable.”
Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte called the matter “exceptionally serious.”
And Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta demanded the U.S. explain its justification for the surveillance.
“We want the truth,” Letta said.
Earlier this week, President Obama personally called French President Francois Hollande following a report in the Le Monde newspaper that more than 70 million French phone calls had been recorded in a 30-day period last year.
The Obama administration did not comment regarding the latest shocking disclosure, and instead pointed to recent comments by White House spokesman Jay Carney.
“We are dealing with (the revelations) through diplomatic channels,” Carney said.
“These are very important relations both economically and for our security, and we will work to maintain the closest possible ties,” he said.
With News Wire Services
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