The Bush administration refused to meet the delegation. The National Security Agency (NSA) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) also refused a meeting, said Carlos Coelho, chairman of the European Parliament temporary committee on the Echelon interception system, on his return back from the United States.
"We are concerned and dismayed that scheduled meetings with the State Department, with the Advocacy Center of the Department of Commerce, were cancelled at the last minute without a satisfactory explanation," Coelho said. "We are very disappointed by the last-minute reluctance of the CIA and the NSA to meet our delegation in spite of the advanced preparations that had been made."
A State Department spokesman said no meeting with the committee had ever been scheduled because U.S. signals intelligence interception is not within its remit. However, three years of research by the European Parliament's Echelon committee says otherwise.
"We have some documents which seem to prove that the CIA is of help [to the Advocacy Center]. This might mean something or it might be purely by chance, as everyone knows the CIA conducts economic analysis as well," European Parliament vice president Gerhard Schmid said last month. He was not able to be contacted Friday.
The Advocacy Center supports U.S. companies in their efforts to secure contracts overseas. It is an office of the State Department.
Schmid said the European Parliament has found no evidence of industrial espionage so far, but warned companies to be vigilant. "It would be rational for companies to protect themselves," he said.
The European Parliament's investigation is limited because it does not have powers in the areas of state security and cannot order national security agencies to reveal sensitive information.
Also, companies are reluctant to cooperate publicly. "Companies that believe they have been spied on refuse to say so openly, but privately they say they are aware they are being spied on but they don't know who by," said David Lowe, who also is involved with the European Parliament committee investigation.
Although it has found no proof yet, the Echelon committee at the European Parliament is certain that such a tapping network exists. "It may or may not be called Echelon. It may or may not be a collaboration of many national security services, but it is a system that intercepts messages all around the world," Schmid said.
According to press reports, Echelon is a system that taps all types of telecom messages carried on satellites or by cable. The NSA is believed to be the main player, but security services in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand are also believed to be a part of it. None of these security agencies has ever confirmed the existence of the giant tapping network.
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US Snubs Euro Parliament Over Echelon
BRUSSELS -- European parliamentarians visiting Washington were snubbed by the Bush administration this week and have cut short their trip intended to pursue their suspicions that the United States uses a global eavesdropping device code-named Echelon to spy on European companies, according to a European Parliamentarian.
[Original headline: European Parliament snubbed by United States over Echelon]
InfoWorld | Paul Meller - May 11 2001
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