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Scandal with tapping of French leadership by US special services to be hushed up — Putin

The Russian president agreed with foreign minister Lavrov that the German example gives the answer: both sides will try to hush it up as soon as possible and forget about it

Vladimir Putin Mikhail Metsel/TASS

Vladimir Putin

© Mikhail Metsel/TASS

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Lavrov not surprised by WikiLeaks’ reports that US spied on French presidents

MOSCOW, June 25. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday agreed with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that the scandal with tapping of the French leadership by American special services will be hushed up by both sides and forgotten.

Lavrov informed participants of a conference of the Russian Security Council about the meeting of the Normandy Four foreign ministers in Paris, whose attention was to a considerable extent distracted by the scandal.

"What will this scandal end with?" Putin asked Lavrov.

"Frankly speaking, I think the German example [with tapping of the German leadership by Americans] gives the answer: both sides will try to hush it up as soon as possible and forget about it," Lavrov said.

"It will be like that," Putin agreed.

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Spying scandal

The scandal in connection with reports on spying on French presidents on the part of American special services broke out Tuesday evening after the results of a high-profile journalistic investigation were published.

Data made public by the Liberation newspaper and the Mediapart investigative website jointly with the Wikileaks whistleblowing website testify that the US National Security Agency, in the period from 2006 until May 2012, eavesdropped on phone talks and intercepted electronic messages of three French presidents — Jacques Chirac, Nicolas Sarkozy and Francois Hollande, as well as their closest aides.

On Wednesday, Paris hosted an extraordinary meeting of the French Defence Council led by President Francois Hollande.

"France will not tolerate any actions jeopardizing its security and the protection of its interests," the Elysee Palace said after the meeting, calling US special services’ actions "absolutely unacceptable."

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Sergey Lavrov Vladimir Putin France

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