Snowden implicates European secret services

“Europe’s hypocrisy,” headlines Gazeta Wyborcza quoting an interview with Edward Snowden published by the weekly Der Spiegel. According to the whistleblower, German, French and British secret services not only take advantage of the NSA’s electronic surveillance, but also run their own spying programmes. “Germans, like the majority of western secret services sleep in the same bed with the NSA,” says Snowden. Nevertheless, in Germany, where the campaign ahead of September's election has just started, politicians say they must “deal with the US” or even put the NSA chief on trial, notes GW stressing that –

on the very same day the EU and the US start talks on the free trade zone agreement, in Washington US secret service experts will have some explaining to do on electronic surveillance when they meet their EU counterparts.

In Germany, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung is demanding a trans-Atlantic freedom agreement banning surveillance between Germany and the United States. As talks on a trans-Atlantic free-trade agreement open, the German daily says, "the heart" of the matter is "simple" –

The United States is a major power and it acts accordingly. [...] The effusive terror shown in Berlin and Paris has more to do with political considerations than with security issues."