Summary US has denied that President Barack Obama knew about electronic surveillance against Angela Merkel.
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The imbroglio over the tapping of Angela Merkel s phone deepened Sunday, after a US denial that President Barack Obama was personally informed for years of electronic surveillance against the German chancellor.
As a sense of betrayal spread in European capitals about spying activities conducted against world leaders and ordinary citizens, German media reports said tapping of Merkel s phone may have begun as early as 2002.
Bild am Sonntag newspaper quoted US intelligence sources as saying that America s National Security Agency chief General Keith Alexander had briefed Obama on the operation against Merkel in 2010.
"Obama did not halt the operation but rather let it continue," the newspaper quoted a high-ranking NSA official as saying.
News weekly Der Spiegel reported that leaked NSA documents showed Merkel s phone had appeared on a list of spying targets for over a decade, and was still under surveillance weeks before Obama visited Berlin in June.
But NSA spokeswoman Vanee Vines, in Washington, flatly denied the claims.
Alexander "did not discuss with President Obama in 2010 an alleged foreign intelligence operation involving German Chancellor Merkel, nor has he ever discussed alleged operations involving Chancellor Merkel," Vines said.
"News reports claiming otherwise are not true," she added.
The allegations, derived from documents acquired from US fugitive defense contractor Edward Snowden, have stoked global outrage that American spy agencies were responsible for broad snooping into the communications of several dozen world leaders and likely millions of ordinary people.
A poll for Der Spiegel found that 60 percent of Germans believe the scandal has damaged bilateral ties.
European leaders have since called for a new deal with Washington on intelligence gathering that would maintain an essential alliance while keeping the fight against terrorism on track.
Germany is to send its own spy chiefs to Washington to demand answers.
Swiss President Ueli Maurer warned the revelations risked "undermining confidence between states."
"We don t know if we re only seeing the tip of the iceberg or if other governments are acting in the same ruthless manner," he told the Schweiz am Sonntag weekly.
With anger simmering in Berlin, Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich sharpened his tone.
"Surveillance is a crime and those responsible must be brought to justice," he told Bild, while Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle decried the "highly damaging" spying among friends.
Merkel confronted Obama with the snooping allegations in a phone call Wednesday saying that such spying would be a "breach of trust."
The Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung said Obama had told Merkel during their call that he had been unaware of any spying against her, while Spiegel said he assured her that he would have stopped the operation at once.
Merkel s office declined to comment on what Obama told her.
The White House has said it is not monitoring Merkel s phone calls and will not do so in future, but it has refused to say whether it did previously.
