{"id":373818,"date":"2018-08-18T00:28:11","date_gmt":"2018-08-17T23:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/have-british-spies-been-hacking-the-eu-consortiumnews\/"},"modified":"2018-08-18T00:28:11","modified_gmt":"2018-08-17T23:28:11","slug":"have-british-spies-been-hacking-the-eu-consortiumnews","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/have-british-spies-been-hacking-the-eu-consortiumnews\/","title":{"rendered":"Have British Spies Been Hacking the EU? \u2013 Consortiumnews"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The European Union has accused British intelligence agencies of disrupting Brexit negotiations\u2014creating a new public dispute that could poison further an already toxic situation, says Annie Machon.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

By Annie Machon
<\/strong><\/span>in Brussels
<\/span><\/strong>Special to Consortium News<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

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For those who cannot get past the Telegraph<\/em> paywall, the gist is that that the European Union has accused the British intelligence agencies of hacking the EU\u2019s side of the Brexit negotiations. Apparently, some highly sensitive and negative EU slides about British Prime Minister Theresa May\u2019s plan for Brexit, the Chequers Plan<\/a>, had landed in the lap of the British government, which then lobbied the EU to suppress publication.<\/span><\/p>\n

Of course, this could be a genuine leak from the Brussels sieve<\/a>, as British sources are claiming (well, they would say that, wouldn\u2019t they?). However, it is plausible that this is the work of the spies, either by recruiting a paid-up agent well placed within the Brussels bureaucracy, or through electronic surveillance.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Ugly Truth of Spying<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Before dismissing the latter option as conspiracy theory, the British spies do have experience. In the run-up to the Iraq war in 2003, the United States and the United Kingdom were desperate to get a United Nations Security Council resolution to invade Iraq, thus providing a fig leaf of apparent legitimacy to the illegal war. However, some countries within the UN had their doubts (including France and Germany), and the U.S. asked <\/a>Britain\u2019s listening post, GCHQ<\/a>, to step up its surveillance game. Forewarned is forearmed in delicate international negotiations.<\/span><\/p>\n

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