Chancellor
Angela Merkel has expressed concern about reports that a German intelligence
officer worked as a double agent for the United States. Bilateral ties had
already been strained by reports of snooping by the NSA.
Deutsche Welle, 7 July 2014
Speaking to
reporters during a visit to Beijing on Monday, the chancellor said that if the
reports that an employee of Germany's BND intelligence service passed
information on to a US contact proved to be true, it would be a "serious
case."
Merkel
added that she would regard this as "a clear contradiction as to what I
regard as trusting cooperation between agencies and partners."
According
to the DPA news agency, the employee in question, a 31-year-old man who was arrested last Wednesday, has admitted to passing on more than 200 documents to
US intelligence agencies in return for a total of 25,000 euros ($34,000) over a
period of two years.
The BND has
said the documents that were passed on contained no sensitive information.
Case under
investigation
Foreign
Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, meanwhile, rejected opposition calls for
Berlin to expel the US ambassador to Germany. Steinmeier told reporters at a
press conference in the Mongolian capital, Ulan Bator, than no further action
would be taken until the results of an investigation into the matter were
known.
On Friday,
the German foreign office called in the US ambassador to express Berlin's
displeasure.
Whatever
the ambassador told foreign office officials does not appear to have satisfied
them, as the controversy showed no sign of dying down by Monday morning.
"I
expect now for everyone to assist in the speedy clarification of the
accusations, and quick and clear statements, also by the US," Interior
Minister Thomas de Maiziere said in comments published in Monday's edition of
the mass-circulation Bild newspaper.
On Sunday,
even German President Joachim Gauck, whose role is largely ceremonial, weighed
in on the issue.
"If it
really is the case that a service has been using an employee from our service
in this way, we have to say: 'That is enough'," the former Protestant
pastor and human rights campaigner in the former communist East Germany said.
There has
still been no official comment on the issue from the United States.
"We
continue to decline comment," Caitlin Hayden, spokesman for the US
National Security Council said on Sunday.
NSA
hangover
The
allegations against the BND employee come with bilateral relations between
Germany and the US still strained over revelations by former US National
Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden.
Among the
allegations were that the NSA not only conducted mass surveillance on German
citizens, but also hacked into Chancellor Merkel's cellular phone.
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