Add Brazil to the list of countries demanding an explanation from Washington, DC after revelations that the US National Security Agency (NSA) has been collecting data on millions of telephone and email conversations.

Brazil's Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota expressed “deep concern at the report that electronic and telephone communications of Brazilian citizens are being the object of espionage by organs of American intelligence.  The Brazilian government has asked for clarifications.”

The O Globo newspaper reported on information smuggled out of the NSA by leaker Edward Snowden, the fugitive security contractor believed to be stalled in a capsule hotel in a Moscow airport.  The report says the US is snarfing up data on nearly as many emails and telephone calls in Brazil as the US is collecting in America itself.

The US has not commented on the O Globo report, which was coauthored by reporter Glenn Greenwald, who has played the lead role in reporting about the contents of Snowden’s cache of US intelligence documents.