More than 30 millions of phone conversations been intercepted by National Security Agency. US Intelligence agency spied on Norwegian civilians between December 10, 2012, and January 8, 2013. Reuters reports.
The NSA said it would not “comment publicly on every specific alleged intelligence activity, and as a matter of policy we have made clear that the United States gathers foreign intelligence of the type gathered by all nations.”
Strong critics for US NSA activity appeared after the latest Snowden revelations. The report was published in a local Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet. A fugitive, former agency contractor Edward Snowden brought to public numerous of facts and counter facts on American Intelligence activity.
Glen Greenwald, a former Guardians journalist who first brought to a public Snowden’s leaks, shows the scale of NSA snooping on foreign governments and leaders such as German Chancellor Angela Merkel as well as on ordinary citizens. Numerous of secret documents, since it was published significantly strained the relationships between USA and its NATO allies.
Dagbladet informs about millions of Norwegians involved in American intelligence campaign. The NSA logged information about the length of the calls, who made and received the call, the location of the phones and their serial numbers. During the same period the Agency monitored 361 million phone calls in Germany, 70 million in France, 61 million in Spain, and 1.8 million in the Netherlands.
Meanwhile, Norway’s Justice Minister called it “a crime under Norwegian low” and unacceptable at all. “Friends should not spy on one another,” Erna Solberg told Norwegian public broadcaster NRK on Tuesday. “It is legitimate to conduct intelligence but it should be targeted and based on suspicions.”
However, head of the Norwegian Intelligence Service Lieutenant General Kjell Grandhagen told at news conference that:
“This was not data collection from Norway against Norway, but Norwegian data collection that is shared with the Americans.”
