Sweden 'spied on Russian leaders for US'

Published time: December 05, 2013 10:06 
Edited time: December 06, 2013 04:37

Swedish signals intelligence agency FRA spied on Russian leaders and shared the data collected with the US, local media report citing Edward Snowden leaks. Sweden’s ‘cable access’ made its position ‘unique’ in the eyes of the NSA.

The NSA eyes the FRA as a ‘leading partner’ among the US agencies foreign partners in the global data collection program, reported Sweden’s Sveriges Television (SVT) citing documents provided by the fugitive whistleblower through US journalist Glenn Greenwald.

"The FRA provided NSA … unique collection on high-priority Russian targets, such as leadership, internal politics," reads one NSA document from dated April 18, 2013.

Ahead of a meeting with officials from FRA, NSA bosses were instructed to praise the Scandinavian partners, another said.

“Thank Sweden for its continued work on the Russian target, and underscore the primary role that FRA plays as a leading partner to work the Russian Target, including Russian leadership, … and … counterintelligence," SVT cited it as saying.

“FRA’s cable access has resulted in unique SIGINT reporting on all of these areas,” it continues, using an abbreviation for signals intelligence.

The SVT report didn’t name any particular individuals and organizations in Russia, which were the subjects of FRA interest. It did not detail the exact methods, which the intelligence agency used to collect information, although the mentioning of cable may refer to internet traffic.

FULL STORY: http://rt.com/news/sweden-spied-russia-nsa-759/