On March 20, 2014, the German Bundestag, the country’s federal parliament, formed a parliamentary investigative commission to probe the surveillance activities of the 5-eyes states, in particular of the National Security Agency (NSA) and the British Government Communication Headquarters (GCHQ), that targeted and involved Germany. The inquiry panel has taken up work, as the German Attorney General has filed charges neither against the NSA, nor against the German government. In February, the Chaos Computer Club and the International Federation for Human Rights filed a criminal complaint against the German government (we blogged about that matter 8 weeks ago).
Germany’s international news outlet Deutsche Welle (DW) covers the investigation in English. As the commission has not been able yet to agree on what role Edward Snowden should play in the process, DW reported two days ago about the resignation of its chairman Clemens Binninger. “A parliamentary inquiry’s first order of business should not be to serve party-political profiling,” Binninger said according to DW, referring to the unresolved question if Snowden should be heard as a whiteness or not. The oppositional Green and Left Party representatives are pressing to summon Snowden as a crucial whiteness. In contrast, the representatives of the ruling Christian and Social Democrat party factions delayed the decision and will, so DW, not take it until after Chancellor Merkel’s visit to the United States in 3 weeks.
It is worth following the happenings on the inquiry panel, as, to me, they reflect the dilemma of German politics to resolve the contradicting interests of a flawless examination of the 5-eyes’ invasive intelligence collection and keeping the diplomatic relationship with the United States in good terms.
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