A report said that US and British spy agencies spied on the United Nations bodies, as well as a number of European officials and former Zionist prime minister.
A report said that US and British spy agencies spied on the United Nations bodies, as well as a number of European officials and former Zionist prime minister.
According to secret documents revealed by intelligence contractor Edward Snowde
n, Britain’s spy agency, the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), and its American counterpart, the NSA, had targeted senior European Union officials, charitable arms of the United Nations (UN), some non-governmental organizations and Ehud Olmert.
The secret documents revealed that the GCHQ and NSA had monitored more than 1,000 targets in at least 60 countries between 2008 and 2011 by secretly accessing cable networks carrying the world’s phone calls and internet traffic, the New York Times reported on Friday.
The vice president of the European Commission, Joaquin Almunia of Spain, who has authority over anti-trust issues, also appears on a list of surveillance targets, it said.
Almunia has clashed with US tech giant Google over how it operates its search engine and when contacted by the Times, Almunia said he was “strongly upset” by the revelations of eavesdropping.
The NSA did not confirm or deny the report but insisted it does not spy to assist American corporations.
According to the classified documents, UN agencies like the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the UN Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR), as well as a large number of diplomatic missions to the UN in Geneva were on the target list.
Other targets included Olmert, European Commission Vice President Joaquin Almunia, German government buildings, and French Defense contractor Thales Group.
According to the documents, several unnamed African heads of state were also monitored by the US and British spy agencies.
The US and British agencies had also spied on non-governmental organizations, including Médecins du Monde - a French organization that provides doctors and medical volunteers to conflict zones - and a representative of the Swiss consulting firm IDEAS Center.
