European Officials Infuriated by Alleged NSA Spying on Friendly Diplomats

Edward Snowden might have vanished from sight since he supposedly hopped a flight from Hong Kong to Moscow on June 23. But the explosive leaks from the former NSA contractor were in plain sight this weekend, when revelations emerged that the U.S. had allegedly bugged E.U. diplomats in New York City, Washington and Brussels. The news ignited splenetic fury from European politicians, who say the allegations could sour their trade negotiations with Washington. “It is shocking that the U.S. should take action against its nearest allies comparable to measures taken in the past by the KGB in the Soviet Union,” European Parliament President Martin Schulz told reporters at Brussels’ military airport on Sunday, adding that he felt “like the representative of an enemy.” The story broke Saturday on the website of Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine, which has a longer account of the details in its print cover story on Monday. To E.U. officials, however, even the sketchy outline was scandalous enough.

The magazine alleges that among Snowden’s documents is proof that the NSA planted bugs in the offices of the E.U.’s mission to the U.N. and in its embassy in Washington, and that the agency hacked into the E.U.’s computer network, allowing the U.S. to eavesdrop on closed-door meetings and to read internal e-mails. “An NSA document dated September 2010 explicitly names the Europeans as a ‘location target,’” says Der Spiegel’s article, whose first byline is Laura Poitras, the New York filmmaker whom Snowden initially contacted in January, saying he had information to leak. It also says the U.S. hacked into the communications system at the Brussels headquarters of the European Council, a highly secured building where leaders gather for summits, and where each of the union’s 27 member countries has offices. To some E.U. officials, that detail might come as little surprise: five years ago, E.U. security officers traced suspected telephone hacking back to the NSA offices in the headquarters of NATO in Brussels, according to Der Spiegel.