U.N. Rights Body for Americas Scolds U.S. on Snooping
A U.N. human rights body urged the United States Monday to adjust its intelligence gathering which has outraged America's allies worried by U.S. snooping.
"There has got to be progress made toward some mechanism -- even given states' legitimate need to work for their security -- that is not invasive in terms of individual rights," said Felipe Gonzalez, the head of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.
The group is part of the Organization of American States, and in turn is part of the U.N. system.
The United States said Monday it needs to better weigh the risks and rewards of its spying activities, as Europe fumed over reports that it eavesdropped on German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other leaders.
In its most comprehensive response yet to the allegations, albeit using heavily nuanced language, the White House said that the fact it had the technical expertise to carry out certain espionage missions, did not mean that it should.
The careful White House repositioning came after days of outrage in Europe over reports apparently based on disclosures by fugitive U.S. security analyst Edward Snowden and evasive statements from the top American officials.
Spain also summoned the U.S. ambassador Monday to denounce newly reported mass U.S. eavesdropping on its citizens' telephone calls as "inappropriate and unacceptable."
Gonzalez, a Chilean, said the scope of the NSA eavesdropping seemed to make it clear that checks and balances were not working properly.
Frank La Rue, a U.N. free speech expert, said "if we allow this to happen, it will inevitably become an abusive system where power will be imposed on people and opinions of dissent and criticism will be silent.
"Therefore this breach of privacy will inevitably in any country become a form of censorship," he argued.
Source: Agence France Presse
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