Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, said she and her French counterpart would launch a “joint initiative” to renegotiate their intelligence services’ co-operation with the US, saying protocols must be set following revelations of widespread American eavesdropping on European leaders.
Ms Merkel said other countries were welcome to join the initiative, but at the outset they would involve only parallel bilateral efforts between the American intelligence agencies and, separately, Paris and Berlin. She said she and François Hollande, the French president, hoped to complete the agreements with the US by the end of the year.
“I think the services need to come to agreement between each other on yardsticks and other norms and standards,” Ms Merkel said at a press conference after the first day of a two-day summit in Brussels. “Words are not sufficient. True change is necessary.”
Although she did not lay out specific red lines to be included in such agreements, some officials said she is likely seeking something similar to the “five eyes” deal between the US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, in which the English-speaking allies work almost seamlessly on signals intelligence […]