Great Satan US ranks EU as key spying priority: Report

A newly released report shows that the US National Security Agency (NSA) ranks the European Union as a key priority in a list of spying targets.

The German weekly Der Spiegel published the report on Saturday, in which it cited a document leaked by American intelligence leaker Edward Snowden.

According to the report, the leaked document dated April 2013 shows that the US secret services focus on retrieving information about the European Union foreign policy, its international trade and economic stability.

In addition, the document revealed that among individual countries the NSA ranked China, Russia, Iran, Pakistan and North Korea as among its top surveillance targets.

The weekly said that this latest report supports earlier leaked documents by Snowden, which revealed that Washington was spying on EU institutions both in the United States and abroad.

The first revelations published in June showed the NSA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have bugged offices and spied on EU internal computer networks in Washington, New York and Brussels; and they have gathered information of American citizens and other people all around the world.

The disclosures triggered an outrage from both European countries and several other countries and even threatened to derail a huge trade deal between the United States and the European Union.

Snowden is wanted by the US, and he is facing charges of espionage and theft of government property in the country.

However, the former NSA contractor was granted a one-year asylum in Russia on August 1, a move that caused US President Barack Obama to cancel an upcoming bilateral meeting with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin.