Lady Europe and Machiavelli

Angela Merkel has said she expects the US not to break German laws in data collection. A newspaper has reported that Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service knew about the US National Security Agency’s snooping for years.

The online espionage activities of the National Security Agency have firmly established themselves as an election talking point in Germany.

"I expect a clear commitment from the US government that they will adhere to German law in the future when on German soil," Merkel said, adding that she did not yet know whether German laws were breached by the NSA or other bodies in the past. "We are friends and allies. We are in a defense alliance and we need to be able to rely on each other."


Ends versus means
The Christian Democrat said that while cooperative efforts to combat terrorism were important and would continue, boundaries should be defined, preferably on an international scale.
"Not everything that is technically feasible - and more and more will be in the future - should be allowed," Merkel said. "The ends don't justify the means here, in our view."

The chancellor added that she would sound out EU leaders on a continental data protection standard agreed by all, saying strong German data protection laws could do nothing to help people using websites based abroad.
"We have a truly excellent federal data protection law, but if Facebook is registered in Ireland, then Irish law applies, and that's why we need a unified European directive," Merkel said. The chancellor also said that, so far as she was aware, her communications had not been tapped.



Asleep at the wheel?
Opposition politicians have sought to pounce on the government's reaction to the NSA spying allegations, claiming that German authorities must have known about the activities and arguing that the government's response was too soft once Snowden went public.

"Mrs. Merkel has sworn as chancellor to protect the German people from harm," Social Democrat challenger Peer Steinbrück said in an interview with the mass-circulation Bild am Sonntag, calling for a parliamentary probe into possible dereliction of duty. "I envisage damage limitation as something rather different."

"Whoever is at the wheel carries the responsibility, regardless of whether they're awake or have dozed off," Steinbrück surmised.

Steinbrück's colleague, SPD secretary general Andrea Nahles, said Merkel's Sunday interview offered only "trivialities."

Meanwhile the daily newspaper Bild reported Monday that Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service has known about NSA snooping for years. Bild reported that the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) had, for example, asked US intelligence services for help when German citizens were kidnapped abroad.

"We know of a long cooperation between the German intelligence service and US agencies," an official quoted by the newspaper said. "The government has not made the details of this cooperation public, except for to a parliamentary committee."

Election countdown

September 22: Germany votes
41% - CDU poll rating
5 % - pro-business Free Democrats (CDU allied)

If the elections were today "Frau" Merkel could not form a government. 

 Sorce: msh, mkg/av (AFP, dpa, Reuters)