Brazil, Mexico ask U.S. to explain if NSA spied on presidents

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Source: Reuters

Brazil, Mexico ask U.S. to explain if NSA spied on presidents

By Anthony Boadle
BRASILIA | Mon Sep 2, 2013 6:39pm EDT

(Reuters) - Brazil assailed the United States on Monday after new allegations that Washington spied on President Dilma Rousseff, complaining that its sovereignty may have been violated and suggesting that it could call off Rousseff's planned state visit to the White House next month.

A Brazilian news program reported on Sunday that the U.S. National Security Agency spied on emails, phone calls and text messages of Rousseff and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, a disclosure that could strain Washington's relations with Latin America's two biggest nations.

Mexico asked the United States to investigate the allegations, saying they would be a serious violation of its sovereignty if proven true.

Brazil's government, already smarting from earlier reports that the NSA spied on the emails and phone calls of Brazilians, called in U.S. ambassador Thomas Shannon and gave the U.S. government until the end of the week to provide a written explanation of the new spying disclosures based on documents leaked by fugitive former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/02/us-usa-security-brazil-mexico-idUSBRE9810B620130902

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1. The U.S.

Every power in the world has spied on many others. It isn't just out of curiousity, but to satisfy a need to know what other countries, friend or foe, are doing that could somehow alter the balance of power in a region or worldwide.

The U.S. leads the pack with the National Security Agency (NSA), a colosal organization whose purpose is to scan the heavens for traces of signals that could identify threats to U.S. National Security. Detection and analysis of said signals would help identify the nature and scope of such threats.

In the process of scanning for signals, information can be captured which could be valuable to the United States and its allies. But also Information which Edward Snowden illegally extracted when he was working at NSA.

The NSA has also a facility for scanning for communications on an ample bandwith, which provides access to information of commercial use, such as email and internet.

Some of the bandwiths can be accessed by anyone with no limitations. Hence the protests from Brazil's lady President Dilma Rousseff