Post date: Jan 19, 2014 2:54:31 PM
U.S. President Barack Obama says in rare TV interview with German public TV ZDF that he would not let intelligence work damage relations between the two countries.
WASHINGTON D.C., UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (JANUARY 18, 2014) (ZDF EXKLUSIV) - U.S. President Barack Obama told Germans and their leader on Saturday (January 18) he would not let intelligence work damage relations, and differences of opinion between the two countries was no reason to wiretap.
In a rare to German TV, Obama set out to mend ties frayed last year by media reports citing leaked intelligence documents that Washington was spying on European Union citizens and had bugged Chancellor Angela Merkel's mobile phone."What I can say is that chancellor Merkel and I may have disagreements on foreign policy... But even if we have disagreements of any sort, the one thing that I know is that I have established a relationship of friendship and trust with her in part because she is always very honest with me and I try to be very honest with her. I don't need and I don't want to harm that relationship by surveillance mechanisms that somehow would impede the kind of communication and trust that we have," Obama told ZDF public TV.
"As long as I am President of the United States the chancellor of Germany will not have to worry about this," he added.
The interview came a day after Obama banned U.S. eavesdropping on the leaders of close allies, among a series of reforms triggered by the revelations of former U.S. security contractor Edward Snowden.
Obama's comments on Saturday were his clearest indication that Germany was included in that list of allies.
The German leader accused the United States of an unacceptable breach of trust after the allegations about her mobile in October and phoned Obama to tell him any bugging was unacceptable. Berlin has since been pushing for a sweeping "no-spy" agreement with Washington.
Obama stopped short of apologising over the allegations on Saturday and defended the importance of U.S. intelligence work for international security.
"There is no point in having an intelligence service if you are restricted to the things that you can read in the New York Times or Der Spiegel (German magazine). The truth of the matter is that, by definition, the job of intelligence is to find out what are folks thinking, what are they doing, that helps service our diplomatic and our policy aims," Obama said.
"We have greater capabilities than most countries around the world. It is important for us then, particularly as technology advances, to make sure we are showing some self-restraint in how we approach this. What you hear today is my first effort at providing that restraint in ways that can assure the German people and our German chancellor and other partners and friends around the world that we are not behaving in ways that would violate their privacy and the truth of the matter is: It will take some time to win that trust back and I think that's entirely appropriate, but hopefully the German people will recall also the incredible partnership that we have and all the good that we have done together and the incredible investment that the United States has in the success ofGermany and the defence of Germany," he added.
Questions about U.S. government spying on civilians and foreign officials burst into the open in June when Snowden leaked secrets about mass collection of telephone data and other secret eavesdropping programs to newspapers before fleeing to Hong Kong and then to Moscow.
Former U.S. security contractor Edward Snowden, currently living in asylum in Russia, is wanted on espionage charges, although some Americans would like him to be granted amnesty for exposing secrets they feel needed to be made public.