France and Mexico have taken exception to new revelations that the White House tapped millions of phone calls from citizens, and hacked into their leaders e-mails, Agence France Press reported.
French President Francois Hollande expressed his "deep disapproval" of the new revelations that the U.S. National Security Agency secretly monitored 70.3 million phone communications in France over 30 days between December 2012 to January of this year, according to Le Monde, France's leading newspaper.
The White House said that President Barack Obama called Hollande to discuss "recent disclosures in the press - some of which distorted our activities and some of which raise legitimate questions for our friends and allies," as reported by The Washington Post.
The NSA disclosures leaked to the media were based on documents provided by Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor who is currently based in Russia. The NSA practices have also angered Brazil, Mexico, Germany, among others in recent months.
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff canceled her visit to the U.S. in protest to similar reports of spying. Negotiations over a trans-Atlantic free trade pact have also threatened to be set back because of anger by European countries to similar practices.
"Our goal is always to try to find the right balance between protecting the security and the privacy of our citizens," Secretary of State Kerry said at a news conference in Paris on Monday. "This work is going to continue, as well as our very close consultations with our friends here in France... Lots of countries are engaged in the activity of trying to protect their citizens and the world," Kerry added.
French Foreign Affairs Minister Laurent Fabius France summoned U.S. ambassador Charles Rivkin on Monday after the new revelations, as Fabius labeled the revelations as unacceptable.
The NSA's targets appeared to be people with suspected links to terrorism, but also involved French business and political figures, Le Monde said.
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