Report: U.S. tapped cardinals’ phones ahead of conclave

ROME — The National Security Agency (NSA) spied on cardinals as they prepared to select the new pope — perhaps including even Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, who emerged from the spring 2013 conclave as Pope Francis, a leading Italian news magazine reported Oct. 30. The news magazine Panorama said the same NSA eavesdropping program that angered leaders in Germany, France, Spain and Mexico also listened in on calls to and from the Vatican, including the phones in the Santa Marta guesthouse that housed Bergoglio and the rest of the College of Cardinals. Pope Francis still lives in the guesthouse, but the magazine did not speculate whether the phones there were still tapped.

The Vatican declined to comment at length about the report. The chief spokesman, Federico Lombardi, issued only a short statement saying, “We have heard nothing of this and are not worried.”