Hollande Tells Obama of 'Deep Disapproval' of U.S. Spying

French President Francois Hollande condemned U.S. spying on French citizens in a call with President Barack Obama on Monday, as a row escalated over U.S. eavesdropping on millions of French phone calls.

Hollande's office said in a statement that he had expressed "deep disapproval of these practices, which are unacceptable between friends and allies because they infringe on the privacy of French citizens."

Hollande "asked that all explanations be provided, as well as all information that could be at the disposal of former NSA consultant Edward Snowden."

The statement said the two leaders had agreed "to work together to determine the facts and the exact scope of surveillance activities" revealed by French newspaper Le Monde.

The two stressed that surveillance operations should be put into a "bilateral framework" and agreed that U.S. and French intelligence agencies would "work together to this effect," the statement said.

Meanwhile, later on Tuesday, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said he had made clear in talks with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry that snooping on its allies was "unacceptable".

In talks in Paris on Tuesday morning, "I said again to John Kerry what Hollande told Barack Obama, that this kind of spying conducted on a large scale by the Americans on its allies is something that is unacceptable," Fabius said.

He said he urged Kerry to provide timely details on reports that the U.S. National Security Agency had secretly monitored tens of millions of phone conversations within France.

"John Kerry responded that it was a system inherited from previous administrations," Fabius told reporters after talks between Western and Arab nations on Syria in London.

"We want these practices to stop, and we want to be informed about everything that exists.

"The fact that such practices have developed to this point between friends, allies, is unacceptable."

The claims were based on leaks from fugitive U.S. ex-security analyst Edward Snowden and published by French newspaper Le Monde and the German weekly Der Spiegel.