DHAKA: French foreign minister Laurent Fabius has summoned the US ambassador over newspaper claims that the US spied on millions of phone calls in France.

France has labelled such activity between allies as ‘unacceptable’, reports the BBC.

Le Monde says the data, based on leaks from ex-intelligence analyst Edward Snowden, suggest the US NSA agency monitored businesses and officials as well as terrorism suspects.

The intercepts were apparently triggered by certain key words.

The paper says the National Security Agency (NSA) spied on 70.3 million phone calls in France in just 30 days between December 10 last year and January 8, 2013.

The agency also apparently captured millions of text messages.

It was unclear whether the content of the calls and messages was stored, or just the metadata, the details of who is speaking to whom.

BDST: 1452 HRS, OCT 21, 2013
RoR/SRS