- LONDON -- A British Sunday
newspaper reported yesterday that the United States is waging a "secret"
campaign to eavesdrop on U.N. Security Council delegations in New York
in its battle to win votes in favor of war against Iraq.
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- The London Observer said it
had obtained a memo describing what it called a "dirty tricks"
surveillance operation that involves interception of the home and office
telephone calls and the e-mail of U.N. delegates.
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- However, the authenticity of
the memorandum was called into question and it was not clear from the text
published by the newspaper that "secret" surveillance, interception
of telephone calls and e-mail, or other extraordinary measures were suggested.
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- The Observer story was widely reported throughout
the Middle East and Europe and could complicate U.S. and British efforts
to win a new resolution in the Security Council.
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- The Observer said the memo was
written by a top official at the National Security Agency (NSA), the U.S.
agency that intercepts communications around the world, and circulated
by e-mail to senior agents in the organization and to a friendly foreign
intelligence agency.
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- The newspaper said the memo was directed
at senior NSA officials and advises them that the agency is "mounting
a surge" aimed at gleaning information not only on how delegations
on the Security Council will vote on any second resolution on Iraq, but
also "policies," "negotiating positions," "alliances"
and "dependencies" - the "whole gamut of information that
could give US policymakers an edge in obtaining results favourable to U.S.
goals or to head off surprises."
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- The Observer identifies "Frank
Koza" as chief of staff in the "Regional Targets" section
of the NSA. Citing sources in Washington that it did not identify, the
newspaper said the NSA initiative was backed by National Security Adviser
Condoleezza Rice and had sparked divisions within the Bush administration.
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- The newspaper said that it had shown
the memo to three former intelligence operatives, whom it also did not
identify, who judged its "language and content" as authentic.
The newspaper also said it had confirmed that a man named Frank Koza does
work for the NSA at a senior post in the "Regional Targets" division
of the organization.
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- The memo's authenticity was
questioned by Internet reporter Matt Drudge, who cited several misspellings
- including the name of the memo's author - on the document as published
by the Observer, and an incorrect version of the agency's "top secret"
stamp.
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- Mr. Drudge, in an article posted
on his Web site (www.drudgereport.com), noted that the memo used British
spellings such as "favourable," "emphasise" and "recognise"
instead of the American use of the letter "z" in the spellings,
and that the spelling of the author of the memo was changed from "Frank
Koza" to "Frank Kozu" on the Observer Web site (www.observer.co.uk)
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- The Observer posted a footnote
late Sunday after receiving "many queries from the United States,"
saying it changed the spellings for the convenience of its British audience.
The newspaper attributed other errors to typographical mistakes.
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- A later version of the Observer
Web site spelled the author's name correctly as "Frank Koza,"
but printed it all in upper case, followed by three question marks.
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- The memo describes orders to
staff at the NSA to step up surveillance "particularly directed at
... U.N. Security Council members" to provide up-to-the-minute intelligence
on their voting intentions.
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- The memo, dated Jan. 31, makes
clear that the targets of the heightened surveillance effort are the delegations
from the so-called "middle six" delegations at the U.N. headquarters
in New York, according to the British weekly. The six are Angola, Cameroon,
Chile, Mexico, Guinea and Pakistan.
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- The United States, Britain and Spain
have sponsored a new U.N. resolution declaring Iraq in noncompliance with
earlier U.N. demands that it disarm, which would in effect authorize the
use of force.
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- Nine votes are required to adopt
the resolution to avoid a veto by one of the five permanent members: the
United States, Britain, China, France and Russia. The United States and
Britain are lobbying for support while France and Russia are lobbying to
defeat the resolution without having to use their vetoes.
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Communications, Inc.
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- http://washingtontimes.com/world/20030303-14680312.htm
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