PARIS — The French government castigated the United States on Monday for carrying out extensive electronic eavesdropping within France, the latest diplomatic backlash against the National Security Agency’s wide surveillance net and another example of how disclosures about the program have strained relations — at least temporarily — with even the closest of Washington’s allies.
The Foreign Ministry summoned the American ambassador, Charles H. Rivkin, who met with ministry officials after an article Monday in Le Monde, the authoritative French newspaper, that the N.S.A. had scooped up 70 million digital communications inside France in a single month, from Dec. 10, 2012, to Jan. 8, 2013.
French officials called the spying “totally unacceptable” and demanded that it cease.
“These kinds of practices between partners are totally unacceptable, and we must be assured that they are no longer being implemented,” Mr. Rivkin was told, according to a ministry spokesman, Alexandre Giorgini.
Source: NY Times
