PARIS: The U.S. must stick to its commitments not to spy on allied governments, President Francois Hollande’s office said, after an emergency meeting discussed a WikiLeaks report that the U.S. had spied on French leaders as they fought to contain the Greek debt crisis.
In a statement after the one-hour meeting with the defense, interior, foreign and justice ministers, Hollande’s office said the spying was “unacceptable” and the U.S. must “strictly respect” commitments it made after an earlier round of spying allegations in 2013.
The espionage is “difficult to understand between countries that have been allies for such a long time, and who collaborate in fighting terrorism,” French government spokesman Stephane Le Foll said on i-Tele television. “But there’s no reason to enter into a crisis. There are enough crises in the world, that between allies we all have to show a sense of responsibility.”
U.S. Ambassador Jane Hartley has been summoned to the foreign ministry for a 6 p.m. meeting, and France’s intelligence coordinator Didier Le Bret will travel to the U.S. in the coming days for talks with his U.S. counterparts, Le Foll said.
WikiLeaks reported that the U.S. National Security Agency spied on Hollande, Nicolas Sarkozy and Jacques Chirac from 2006 to 2012. The group, which has been publishing unauthorized documents since 2006, listening in on discussions about the euro debt crisis and French relations with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, including secret French government meetings about the possibility of Greece leaving the euro.
