There have recently been some revelations about the NSA in Germany. The NSA and BND cooperate a lot more than you’d suspect based on German people’s concern for privacy.
Charged with espionage on behalf of the NSA. Does this imply that Germany’s prosecutorial service is identifying the USA as a hostile power? What do the diplomats have to say about that?
Breaking the law while doing something in the service of a foreign power is still breaking the law regardless of whether that foreign power is friend or foe. (I’m not familiar with German law, but if the parliamentary inquiry was not public, then spying on it could be illegal regardless of whether a foreign power was involved at all. Eg. there are many meetings in the white house, congress and senate where an American citizen would be breaking the law to spy on, even if working for other Americans).
No, just a foreign power is enough. Foreign spies that are accredited with an embassy or part of foreign armed forces stationed here are usually effectively tolerated, but obviously that doesn’t apply in this case.
Germany Spy, second cousin of Florida Man. Their family reunions are CRAZY!
E.g., Jonathan Pollard is still in a US prison for spying on behalf of Israel.
Or putting the horse back in front of the cart, would the USA deciding to spy on Germany imply that it is the USA that is identifying Germany as a hostile power? What do the diplomats have to say about that? 
Chevy Chase - Spies Like Us: http://youtu.be/jK0N74BDC5k
I’m sure that now that they have someone in custody they’ll get to the bottom of it. Ze haf vays of mak’king you talk!
What is it about that acronym BND that makes me think of severe German punishment?
It tends to be particularly bad if you were recruited to spy because of your government job. The ones that make you a useful asset tend to be very touchy about employee allegiance. Also a very bad idea to be involved when a high level scandal is going down. Sufficiently chummy governments may prefer to settle things off the record; but if things are getting icy that’s much less likely.
Unless you want to cause a real incident, you have to put up with the ‘diplomats’ that are likely to be mixed in with the actual diplomats. You can expel them at your discretion, if you don’t mind sending a bit of a slur to their government; but prosecution or just-shooting are Just Not Done, Very Uncouth.
Some lesser diplomatic staff don’t actually have diplomatic immunity (we had that spat with India over one of theirs in that category recently), and they might be an option, albeit not one that encourages warm feelings if you exercise it.
Hmmmm. Tell me about your childhood, BouNDegar…
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