Report: Add 60 Million Spanish Phone Calls To NSA's List

Some of the electronic equipment atop the National Security Agency's facility in Fort Meade, Md.

Greg Mathieson/MAI/Landov

Some of the electronic equipment atop the National Security Agency's facility in Fort Meade, Md.

Greg Mathieson/MAI/Landov

Spain's El Mundo newspaper is reporting that a document leaked by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden shows that the NSA scooped up data from 60 million phone calls made in Spain over a four-week period in late 2012 and early 2013, The Associated Press writes.

As the AP notes, the El Mundo report:

"Comes a week after the French paper Le Monde reported similar allegations of U.S. spying in France and German magazine Der Spiegel reported that Washington tapped Chancellor Angela Merkel's mobile phone. The leaders of Brazil and Mexico are also reported to have been spied on. ...

"There was no immediate reaction to the report from either the Spanish government or the U.S. embassy in Madrid. However, U.S. Ambassador James Costos had already been summoned to the Foreign Ministry on Monday to discuss reports that indicated Spain was a U.S. spying target."

Meanwhile, The Guardian noted over the weekend that "a report in Der Spiegel said [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel's mobile number had been listed by the NSA's Special Collection Service (SCS) since 2002 and may have been monitored for more than 10 years. It was still on the list — marked as 'GE Chancellor Merkel' — weeks before President Barack Obama visited Berlin in June."

Also, The Wall Street Journal reports that Obama wasn't aware until his second term that the NSA had been spying on other world leaders. And, the Journal adds that the NSA:

"Ended a program used to spy on German Chancellor Angela Merkel and a number of other world leaders after an internal Obama administration review started this summer revealed to the White House the existence of the operations, U.S. officials said."

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/10/28/241347421/report-add-60-million-spanish-phone-calls-to-nsas-list?ft=1&f=1019
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