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| Revealed: US dirty tricks to win vote on Iraq war |
| 2003-03-01 |
| Via Drudge, who already is debunking it Secret The United States is conducting a secret 'dirty tricks' campaign against UN Security Council delegations in New York as part of its battle to win votes in favour of war against Iraq. Details of the aggressive surveillance operation, which involves interception of the home and office telephones and the emails of UN delegates in New York, are revealed in a document leaked to The Observer. The disclosures were made in a memorandum written by a top official at the National Security Agency - the US body which intercepts communications around the world - and circulated to both senior agents in his organisation and to a friendly foreign intelligence agency asking for its input. Very likely a fake memo. The memo describes orders to staff at the agency, whose work is clouded in secrecy, to step up its surveillance operations 'particularly directed at... UN Security Council Members (minus US and GBR, of course)' to provide up-to-the-minute intelligence for Bush officials on the voting intentions of UN members regarding the issue of Iraq. As Drudge notes, the text of the memo uses British English spellings at several points, not American English. The leaked The Dated 31 January 2003, the It was Koza specifies that the information will be used for the US's 'QRC' - Quick Response Capability - 'against' the key delegations. Suggesting the levels of surveillance of both the office and home phones of UN delegation members, Koza also asks regional managers to make sure that their staff also 'pay attention to existing non-UN Security Council Member UN-related and domestic comms [office and home telephones] for anything useful related to Security Council deliberations'. Koza also addresses himself to the foreign agency, Disclosure of the US operation comes in the week that Blix will make what many expect to be his final report to the Security Council. It also comes amid increasingly Sources in Washington familiar with the operation said last week that there had been a division among Bush administration officials over whether to pursue such a high-intensity surveillance campaign with some warning of the serious consequences of discovery. The existence of the surveillance operation, understood to have been requested by President Bush's National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, is deeply The language and content of the memo were judged to be authentic The NSA main switchboard put The Observer through to extension 6727 at the agency which was answered by an assistant, who confirmed it was Koza's office. However, when The Observer asked to talk to Koza about the surveillance of diplomatic missions at the United Nations, it was then told 'You have reached the wrong number'. On protesting that the assistant had just said this was Koza's extension, the assistant repeated that it was an erroneous extension, and hung up. Well-trained assistant. While many diplomats at the UN assume they are being bugged, the The disclosure comes at a time when diplomats from the countries have been complaining about the outright 'hostility' of US tactics in recent days to persuade then to fall in line, including threats to economic and aid packages. In other words, "don't vote against us and then expect us to act as nothing ever happened." I suppose that's a threat, though diplomats are supposed to understand realism when it's applied with a wet mullet to the kisser. The operation appears to have been spotted by rival organisations in Europe. 'The Americans are being very purposeful about this,' said a source at a European intelligence agency when asked about the US surveillance efforts. Just as purposeful as the French. |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #3 Footnote of the Observer: "This email was originally transcribed with English spellings standardised for a British audience. Following enquiries about this, we have reverted to the original US-spelling as in the document leaked to The Observer." |
| Posted by: True German Ally 2003-03-02 11:03:19 |
| #2 Excuse me but what's the point here? Everybody knows that enbassies in D.C. are bugged and of course the UN is bugged too. Thats why delegates use a safe room when they have to discuss something serious. At least I know that the Germans do. And a diplomat who sends unencrypted emails should be shot anyway. |
| Posted by: True German Ally 2003-03-02 08:28:04 |
| #1 hmmm.. what "European intelligence agency" was this? The French, perchance? They can be expected to give an honest answer. Don't the British have really nasty Libel laws? I'd hate to imagine what potential damages would look like. |
| Posted by: Dishman 2003-03-02 00:22:24 |