The European Parliament has vowed to investigate allegations that the Greek government was actively spying on an opposition party leader who is also a member of the European Parliament.
Juri Laas, the spokesman for the European Parliament’s President Roberta Metsola, commented on the ongoing spying scandal saying: “Illegal surveillance of members’ communications is intolerable and inexcusable.”
“Such infringements of the principles and values which form the basis of our democratic system cannot be tolerated, irrespective of the member state where they occur,” Laas added, Greek newspaper Ekathimerini reports.
According to Laas, President Metsola has expressed interest in the case and may look to ban illegal domestic spying in the European Union.
The spying allegations revolve around Nikos Androulakis, the leader of Greece’s Socialist PASOK-KINAL party, and came to light after Greece’s National Intelligence Service (EYP) chief Panagiotis Kontoleon admitted last month that his agency had spied on journalist Thanasis Koukakis.
The phone belonging to Koukakis was infected with spyware named Predator and Androulakis found his phone also infected with the spyware after it was discovered by European Union cyber security experts.
Since then, Panagiotis Kontoleon resigned from his position as head of Greek intelligence along with the Greek government’s General Secretary, Grigoris Dimitriadis.
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, meanwhile, denied any knowledge of the spying on Androulakis, stating earlier this month that “it may have been according to the letter of the law but it was a mistake, I was not aware of it and I would never allow it.”
The Greek leader later went on to clarify that there had been a warrant issued to surveil the mobile phone of Androulakis in September of last year, but the warrant that been done according to the law and had only lasted a total of three months.
“The procedure had the approval of the prosecutor, exactly as stipulated by the provision passed in 2018 by the previous government. It lasted three months and was automatically stopped, as provided by law, a few days after Mr Androulakis was elected president of KINAL,” Mitsotakis said.
Androulakis was elected the leader of the Movement for Change (KINAL), an alliance of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) and the Movement of Democratic Socialists (KIDISO), in December of last year.
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