MADRID, Spain – A Spanish judge probing the alleged hacking of ministers’ phones with the Pegasus spyware has halted his investigation because of an “absolute” lack of cooperation from Israel, a court statement said Monday.
In June 2022, José Luis Calama said he had sent the Israeli government a formal request for international judicial assistance, known as a letter rogatory, asking for information about software made by the Israeli firm NSO Group Was.
He also said that he wanted to go there personally to take witness statements from the chief executive of the NSO.
But on Monday, Spain’s top criminal court, the Audiencia Nacional, said Calama had decided to temporarily close the case “due to the complete lack of legal cooperation from Israel, which has not responded to the Rogatory Commission… .and has stopped the investigation.” go ahead.”
The investigation began in May 2022, when the Spanish government said the spyware, which infiltrates cellphones to extract data or activate cameras or microphones to spy on their owners, was used against top politicians .
Among those targeted were the phones of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, Defense Minister Margarita Robles, Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlasca and Agriculture Minister Luis Planas.
This studio photographic illustration shows a smartphone with the website of Israel’s NSO Group containing the ‘Pegasus’ spyware displayed in Paris on July 21, 2021. (Joel Saget/AFP)
But the Israeli government never responded to the request for assistance, which was sent “four times”, meaning “probably never,” the court said in a statement, indicating that the only remaining option was diplomacy.
It added, “What is now left is a possible diplomatic channel capable of promoting compliance with the obligations derived from international treaties.”
The court noted that Sanchez’s phone was targeted on five occasions between October 2020 and December 2021.
But despite a prolonged analysis of the four phones, it had not been possible to determine “who was behind the attacks”, the statement said.
The Spanish government attributed this to an “external attack”, while the Spanish press pointed the finger at Morocco in the context of the ongoing diplomatic crisis between the two countries at the time.
The scandal came to light in April 2022, when Canadian cyber security watchdog Citizen Lab published a report saying that the phones of at least 65 Catalan separatists had been tapped following the failed 2017 independence bid.
Catalan separatists gather to celebrate the declaration of the Catalan Republic at Sant Jaume square in Barcelona on October 27, 2017. (AFP Photo / PAU Barena)
Several weeks later, spy chief Paz Esteban told a parliamentary committee that 18 Catalan separatists, including Catalan regional leader Pere Aragones, had been spied on with the Pegasus software – but always with court approval.
He was later fired.
