Germany Abandons Investigation Into NSA Spying on Chancellor Merkel

After the purported eavesdropping by the NSA on German chancellor Angela Merkel's telephone commnunications, the German government opened an investigation. However, writes Bruce66423: A lack of evidence means that the investigation has now ended. Our congratulations to the NSA for covering their tracks so well. Note that it was announced on a Friday evening, which is universally recognised as the time to release the news you don't want to get attention. Also at The Guardian and the BBC; from the Guardian's version: The investigation came after Der Spiegel reported in October 2013 that the NSA had a database containing Merkel’s personal phone number. Merkel publicly expressed outrage and dispatched a team of senior German intelligence officers to Washington, supposedly to extract a ”no spy” agreement. When the row was its height, the chancellor said: “The charges are grave and have to be cleared up.” ... The White House, responding to the Der Spiegel story in 2013, said it was not spying on Merkel at present and nor would it in the future, but refused to say whether it had in the past, which was interpreted by some as an admission of guilt.

Comments

Re:Germany should start

[cold fjord]

LOL .... no, I didn't miss that. Did they cut off the shipments? Yes. The "presence of international observers" would report the same thing - they cut off shipments. How do you think that makes a difference? "It was reported today that Russia cut off shipments of gas to Europe. International observers confirm the cut off." Yep, they really weren't getting gas. Was there doubt? We people without gas less cold because of the international observers?

There were diplomatic efforts to resolve the situation, but I don't see anything about those observers "mediating" the crisis.

Your defense of Putin's cutoff - is that a politically motivated decision? Or just a job? Or maybe an adverse reaction to being called?