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Germany Might Have Spied On Kerry And Clinton

Reports from German media allege that the nation's intelligence agency eavesdropped on phone calls made by two U.S. Secretaries of State.

Germany Might Have Spied On Kerry And Clinton
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Angela Merkel wasn't too thrilled to find out the U.S. had been spying on her earlier this year, but new reports say Germany might have done the same to Hillary Clinton.

Multiple German outlets report that Germany's foreign intelligence service, the BND, tapped phone calls made by both Hillary Clinton when she was Secretary of State and, more recently, John Kerry in 2013. 

How did these outlets uncover this info? Well, back in July a German BND employee was arrested and found to have been leaking documents to the U.S.

It's those documents, German broadcaster NDR says, that revealed the spying incidents. The German government has denied any systematic spying on the U.S. and called these incidents unintentional. 

Der Spiegel reports that the intercepted phone call by Clinton was during a discussion with former U.N. secretary-general Kofi Annan on the same frequency that suspected terrorists in the Middle East were using.

Another German newspaper writes that the calls should have been deleted immediately. The fact that they weren't, says one German official, was "idiocy."

Also included in the documents was the BND's "Mission Statement of the Federal Government," which describes the extent of its spying operations. 

According to Der Spiegel, that mission statement greenlights spying on some of Germany's NATO all Turkey. The U.S., however, is not included as an acceptable country to spy on.

Given Merkel's complaints of U.S. spying over the past few months, the fact that Germany is spying on any of its allies could potentially embarrass the European leader. 

So far, the U.S. embassy in Berlin and the State Department have declined to comment. The German government has also declined to comment on allegations of spying on Turkey while it investigates the leaked documents.

This video contains images from Getty Images.