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The case facilities on joint spying operations by US and Danish intelligence businesses, which reportedly eavesdropped on Western leaders
Former Danish Protection Minister Claus Hjort Frederiksen has been charged with divulging state secrets and techniques, after claiming navy intelligence labored with the US Nationwide Safety Company (NSA) to spy on quite a lot of overseas officers, amongst them ex-German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Frederiksen confirmed the costs in a Fb submit on Tuesday, saying he had been indicted for the “disclosure or passing on of state secrets and techniques.” He insisted on his innocence, nevertheless, claiming the allegations are motivated by politics
“I deny having exceeded the boundaries of my far-reaching freedom of speech as a politician, and I’ve not revealed alleged state secrets and techniques. Interval,” he stated, including “I’ll demand a jury trial, as this can be a political case.”
Danish officers declined to quote Frederiksen by title in discussing the costs, with prosecutor Jakob Berger Nielsen saying the case “consists of extremely categorised info that can not be introduced overtly.”
Whereas the main points of the state secrets and techniques indictment stay underneath wraps, after going through preliminary expenses final yr, Frederiksen instructed the case was linked to public feedback he made concerning joint surveillance missions involving Denmark’s Protection Intelligence Service and the NSA. In a number of media interviews in 2020 and 2021, Frederiksen stated the Danish company helped the NSA snoop on high-level officers in France, Germany, Norway, and Sweden – together with Merkel and a number of other of her political rivals.
Although the NSA’s half within the spying was revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden – who leaked an enormous trove of categorised paperwork whereas working as a personal contractor in 2013 – Denmark’s function solely got here to gentle in subsequent media reviews, which cited a confidential Danish intelligence evaluation carried out following the Snowden revelations.
Frederiksen served as protection minister between 2016 and 2019 and later entered politics underneath Denmark’s Liberal Celebration. He retired from public life final yr, nevertheless, which means his parliamentary immunity has lapsed and he can now be prosecuted.
No trial date has been set for the previous official, who faces as much as 12 years in jail if convicted.
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