A security analyst says New Zealand could run into diplomatic problems with France because of revelations the government is spying on an unprecedented scale in the Pacific.
The Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB)'s spy base at Waihopai, near Blenheim. Photo: SUPPLIED
The journalist Nicky Hager says he has seen new evidence that the Government Communications Security Bureau collects vast amounts of information from the Pacific and gives it to the United States National Security Agency
Mr Hager says documents provided by the American whistleblower Edward Snowden show the GCSB intercepts communications from countries such as Fiji, Tonga, Vanuatu and Samoa, and even nations as small as Tuvalu, Nauru and Kiribati.
Security analyst, Paul Buchanan, says the information seems to show that some of the spying is in French territories and that would be a problem if France doesn't know.
"The French Pacific fleet is based in Papeete, the French Pacific army is based in Noumea. They have military assets and the countries we are spying on and so troop movement, vessel movements could be all part of parcel of what we are gathering."
Before the information was released, the Prime Minister John Key told the New Zealand Herald that he could guarantee the revelations would be wrong.
