Emergency meeting regarding the spying on Dilma.
"We are in a state of emergency," says the Secretary-General of the Presidency, Gilberto Carvalho; President Dilma Rousseff summons the Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Defense, Communications, Chief of Staff, and Social Communication to define Brazil's reaction to the espionage practiced by the United States government; on the morning of Monday, October 2nd, Foreign Minister Luiz Alberto Figueiredo summoned American Ambassador Thomas Shannon to demand explanations; the Minister of Justice will meet with the President at 15:00 PM; Brazil's response to American wiretapping of presidential emails promises to be harsh; the official trip to the US on October 23rd will only be confirmed upon "satisfactory" explanations from the Obama administration.
247 - Relations between Brazil and the United States are shaken by allegations that President Dilma Rousseff's emails were spied on by the US government. To coordinate a reaction that promises to be strong, Dilma convened an emergency meeting this Monday morning, December 2nd, in her office at the Planalto Palace. The ministers summoned were the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Luiz Alberto Figueiredo; Defense, Celso Amorim; Communications, Paulo Bernardo; the Chief of Staff, Gleise Hoffmann; the Secretary of Communication, Helena Chagas; and the Secretary-General of the Presidency, Gilberto Carvalho. "We are in an emergency situation," said Carvalho before the meeting.
Even before this meeting, Foreign Minister Luiz Alberto Figueiredo officially summoned the United States Ambassador to Brazil, Thomas Shannon, to the Itamaraty Palace to demand initial explanations. Shannon left the meeting without speaking to the press. In the afternoon, the president will meet with the Minister of Justice, José Eduardo Martins Cardozo, to discuss the same matter.
In addition to a predictable harsh statement against the American attitude, denounced by the Fantástico program on Rede Globo, based on revelations by journalist Glenn Greenwald, who had access to documents obtained by former NSA technician Edward Snowden, exiled in Russia, the Brazilian government's attitude may even be to cancel President Dilma's official trip to Washington, scheduled for October 23. A gala dinner is planned in her honor at the White House, but the menu is already proving unpalatable for Brazil. The Brazilian government has already decided to appeal to the UN to request a discussion on violations of the privacy of Brazilian authorities and citizens.
Documents classified as top secret, which are part of an internal presentation by the United States National Security Agency (NSA), obtained by Fantástico, show President Dilma Rousseff, and what appear to be her main advisors, as direct targets of NSA espionage. A code indicates this.
Journalist Glenn Greenwald, co-author of the report, was the one who received the documents from Snowden. Glenn stated that he received the document in the first week of June, when he was with Snowden in Hong Kong. "He gave me these documents along with all the other documents in the original package."
Below is a news article from Agência Brasil regarding this matter:
Dilma summons ministers for emergency meetings.
Reporter from Agência Brasil
Brasilia - President Dilma Rousseff summoned ministers this morning (2) for two emergency meetings at the Planalto Palace to address allegations of espionage by the United States against her and close advisors, released this Sunday (1st) on the program Fantastic, from TV Globo.
The first meeting began around 10:00 AM and was attended by the Ministers of Justice, José Eduardo Cardozo, the Institutional Security Office, General José Elito, and the General Secretariat, Gilberto Carvalho. The second meeting, held immediately afterward, included, in addition to Cardozo, the Ministers of Communications, Paulo Bernardo, Defense, Celso Amorim, and Foreign Affairs, Luiz Alberto Figueiredo Machado.
According to the Presidential Communications Secretariat, both meetings have already ended. Neither minister spoke. Since the information began to be released in June, the Ministers of Communications and Justice have expressed concern about the allegations, which they consider acts against the freedom of citizens and national sovereignty.
Today, the United States ambassador to Brazil, Thomas Shannon, went to Itamaraty to provide clarifications on the matter to Foreign Minister Figueiredo Machado. After the meeting, Shannon left without speaking to the press, and Figueiredo Machado went to the meeting with Dilma and other ministers.
Edited by: Graça Adjuto and Talita Cavalcante
Read also the Reuters report on the meeting between the Brazilian Foreign Minister and the US Ambassador:
Brazil summons US ambassador after allegations of espionage against Dilma.
(Reuters) - Brazil's Foreign Ministry summoned the U.S. ambassador to Brazil, Thomas Shannon, to provide clarification on Monday regarding allegations that a U.S. agency was monitoring the content of President Dilma Rousseff's phone calls, emails, and text messages.
Following the incident, the president called an emergency ministerial meeting this Monday at the Planalto Palace.
According to revelations made on Sunday by the TV Globo program "Fantástico," the president was allegedly the target of espionage by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA).
Shannon met this morning with the Brazilian Foreign Minister, Luiz Alberto Figueiredo, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported. The Ministry did not provide details about the meeting.
The "Fantástico" report was based on documents obtained by American journalist Glenn Greenwald from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. Greenwald, who lives in Rio de Janeiro, was described as a co-author of the report.
The Minister of Justice, José Eduardo Cardozo, who has just returned from a trip to the US to discuss previous allegations of espionage, said in an interview with CBN radio this Monday that, if the content of the documents is confirmed, "it is a clear offense to Brazilian sovereignty, a situation that will evidently give rise to important measures that the Brazilian government will have to take."
Cardozo traveled to Washington last week and met with US Vice President Joe Biden and other officials to seek more details about a series of previous revelations regarding US interception of electronic and telephone data in Brazil, apparently less serious, based on documents leaked by Snowden.
According to Cardozo, President Dilma herself instructed the Brazilian Foreign Ministry to summon the US ambassador to provide explanations, and the Brazilian government has already decided to take the matter to international forums.
The minister stated in the radio interview that the data presented in the "Fantástico" report shows that monitoring, contrary to the official version of the US government, "occurs not only in situations of investigation of illicit acts, but also in situations of a political nature and perhaps even, as the report touches upon, in situations of a commercial nature."
Dilma has a state visit to Washington scheduled for October to meet with US President Barack Obama. The trip aims to reinforce how relations between Brazil and the US have improved since Dilma took office in 2011.
The Sunday report showed documents attributed to the NSA revealing a communication network between the president and her top advisors, but did not show the content of the messages.
A separate document, from June 2012, contained excerpts from a written message sent by the President of Mexico, Enrique Peña Nieto, who was still a presidential candidate at the time. In the messages, Peña Nieto discussed names for his cabinet should he be elected.
The two documents were part of an NSA case study showing how data could be filtered, according to Fantástico.
American Snowden is currently living in exile in Russia. The Brazilian news program "Fantástico" said it spoke with Snowden via the internet, adding that he could not comment on the content of the report because his asylum agreement in Russia does not authorize him to speak about the leaks.
(Reporting by Brian Winter in São Paulo, with additional reporting by Maria Carolina Marcello in Brasília)