Brazilian anger at claims NSA spied on president
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The American ambassador to Brazil was summoned by authorities yesterday over new allegations that the US National Security Agency spied on President Dilma Rousseff.
Thomas Shannon arrived and left Brazil’s foreign ministry without speaking to reporters.
There was no comment from Brazilian officials either.
Rousseff’s office also said that it had no immediate comment, but said the president was meeting with top ministers to discuss the case.
Ricardo Ferraco, head of the Brazilian Senate’s foreign relations committee, said that lawmakers had already agreed to formally investigate the NSA’s focus on Brazil because of earlier revelations, and that the probe would likely start work this week.
“I feel a mixture of amazement and indignation. It seems like there are no limits.
“When the phone of the president of the republic is monitored, it’s hard to imagine what else might be happening,” Ferraco told reporters in Brasilia. He added: “It’s unacceptable that in a country like ours, where there is absolutely no climate of terrorism, that there is this type of spying.”
US journalist Glenn Greenwald, a Guardian newspaper columnist who had obtained secret files from NSA leaker Edward Snowden, told Globo television that the agency had snooped on the communications of Rousseff and of Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto.
A Brazilian foreign ministry spokesman said that Shannon “was called to explain” the claims made by Greenwald, who is based in Rio de Janeiro.
“If these facts prove to be true, it would be unacceptable and could be called an attack on our country’s sovereignty,” Justice Minister Jose Eduardo Cardozo said.
A spokesman for Pena Nieto said any reaction would be released in a statement.
Greenwald told the television station that a document dated June 2012 showed that Nieto’s emails were being accessed one month before he was elected.
The NSA also intercepted some of Nieto’s voicemails, including messages in which the future leader discussed potential cabinet members.
As for Rousseff, the NSA said in the document it was trying to better understand her communication methods by using a program to access Internet content the president visited.
In July, Greenwald co-wrote articles revealing that the US had a joint NSA-CIA base in Brazil to gather data on emails and calls flowing through the country.
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