President of United States Barack Obama has said he will not let controversial surveillance by US intelligence services dent Washington’s ties with Germany.
Speaking to Germany’s ZDF TV on Saturday, he indicated that US wiretapping Chancellor Angela Merkel’s mobile phone had been a mistake and would not happen again.
“I don’t need and don’t want to harm that (US-German) relationship by a surveillance mechanism that somehow would impede the kind of communication and trust that we have.”
“As long as I’m president of the United States, the chancellor of Germany will not have to worry about this,” he added.
But Obama also stressed the US intelligence services would continue to be concerned with what world governments’ intentions were.
“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,” he said.
“The truth of the matter is that by definition the job of intelligence is to find out: Well, what are folks thinking? What are they doing?”
After the row broke out last year, German Chancellor Merkel accused the US of an intolerable violation of trust.
The interview was broadcasted a day after the president ordered restrictions on the use of bulk data collected by US intelligence agencies, adding that civil liberties must be respected.
