Youth chief Irwan Fahmi Ideris (second left) of Perkasa, a Malaysian non-governmental organisation (NGO), and other members walk to the Singapore embassy to hand in a memorandum against Singapore helping Western intelligence agencies to spy on Malaysia, in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.

AFP/Singapore

Singapore has assured Malaysia that it will not do anything to harm relations as the city-state grapples with allegations that it was part of a US-led electronic spying operation in Asia.

“We have no interest in doing anything that might harm our partners or the friendship between our two countries,” Ong Keng Yong, Singapore’s high commissioner (ambassador) to Malaysia, said in comments carried by the Straits Times newspaper yesterday.

“We have an excellent bilateral relationship and co-operate closely on many matters of common interest,” he said without addressing the spying issue directly.

Singapore’s envoys to Malaysia and Indonesia were summoned by their host governments Tuesday following an Australian media report that implicated Singapore and South Korea in a spying ring.

Singapore’s foreign and defence ministries have not replied to AFP queries about the report, based on leaks provided by fugitive former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden.

Southeast Asia’s biggest telecom firm SingTel, which had been identified in Monday’s report as a key party to the alleged tapping of undersea telecommunication cables, also declined comment.

SingTel is majority-owned by state investment firm Temasek Holdings.

The Sydney Morning Herald said Singapore and South Korea played key supporting roles in a “Five Eyes” intelligence network grouping the US, Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. As a major hub for regional telecommunication traffic, high-tech Singapore was an important link in the surveillance network, it said.

Indonesia’s President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyuno had reacted angrily to the reports.