India says it intends pursue snooping issue with US

Concerned over US intelligence snooping over it as revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden, India today said it intends to pursue the issue with the US administration.
Asked if the issue had figured during the recent meetings Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh had with senior US administration officials during her visit, the Spokesperson of External Affairs Ministry parried a direct answer but said it has been raised at different fora.
This is an issue which is of concern to India and the government intends to pursue it, he said.
India, which has raised the issue with the US -both in Washington and here- has told America that the monitoring of online traffic by their security agencies as was revealed by Snowden, the National Security Agency contractor-turned- whistleblower, was not restricted to data collection purposes.

The issue was first raised by National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon with US Ambassador to India Nancy Powell and then by External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid during the meeting here with his US counterpart John Kerry in June.
Indian mission in Washington had also taken up the issue with the US government when reports of US intelligence snooping on various countries including India emerged in July.