Spain complained that agents linked to US embassy had ‘bribed Spanish agents for secrets’
- Spain’s defence minister said the government filed a complaint to the US after Spanish intelligence agents ‘leaked secret information to the US’
- According to newspaper El País, Spain expelled 2 US intelligence agents posted to the embassy in Madrid for allegedly trying to bribe officers for secrets
Spain’s Defence Minister Margarita Robles said on Thursday that the Spanish government recently filed a complaint to the United States after discovering that Spanish intelligence agents had allegedly leaked secret information to the US.
“Complaints from Spain were conveyed at the time,” said Robles, but she insisted that the case did not “affect the fundamental core of the relations between two countries that are allies and friends.”
She said the intelligence centre itself had filed a complaint with a provincial court in Madrid.
Robles declined on Thursday to provide any further information, saying the case was under judicial gag order.
She was speaking after Spain’s leading newspaper El País reported that the US ambassador to Spain was summoned earlier this year for a meeting with the defence minister and that the foreign minister had also complained to the ambassador by phone.