German news weekly Der Spiegel charged Friday that it was spied on by U.S. secret services and said it had filed a criminal complaint with the country's chief prosecutor.

The Hamburg-based magazine has taken a leading role in reporting the disclosures of fugitive U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden on mass surveillance by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA).

German Chancellor Angela Merkel's office asked the U.S. ambassador to come in Thursday over new allegations of NSA spying, which threaten to drive a new wedge through transatlantic ties.

In the latest eruption in a nearly two-year rift over illicit espionage, Merkel's chief of staff Peter Altmeier called the U.S. envoy, John Emerson, to the chancellery "to make clear that respect for German law is non-negotiable and proven violations will be prosecuted", Merkel spokesman Steffen Seibert said. 

New documents released by WikiLeaks show that the United States did not just tap German Chancellor Angela Merkel's phone but also eavesdropped on several ministers, the German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported Wednesday.

German-U.S. relations were badly strained after fugitive U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden in 2013 revealed widespread U.S. foreign surveillance, although a probe into the alleged tapping of Merkel's mobile phone was dropped last month over a lack of evidence.

Germany's domestic intelligence agency has warned that Hizbullah has 950 active operatives in the country while Islamist Movement Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, has 300.

The agency (BfV) did not give further details on Hizbullah's alleged operations in Germany but said the country “is on the spectrum of goals for Islamic terrorists.”

A coach driver died and another was seriously injured on Sunday when their vehicle overturned on a Belgian highway with 34 British schoolchildren on board, an official said.

One of the children, all aged between 11 and 13, was in intensive care receiving treatment for a head injury, the school said.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II visited a former Nazi concentration camp for the first time during a state visit to Germany Friday, meeting Holocaust survivors and British veterans who helped liberate the site 70 years ago.

The trip to Bergen-Belsen in northwestern Germany by the 89-year-old queen -- accompanied by her husband, Prince Philip, 94 --  was a "personal visit" and "her wish", sources said.

European leaders condemned Friday's "heinous" suspected Islamist attack on a gas factory in France and massacres in Tunisia and Kuwait, vowing to maintain a united front against "barbarism".

One person was decapitated near Lyon in southeastern France while in Tunisia gunmen killed at least 27 people at a beach resort and in Kuwait a suicide bombing at a mosque claimed by Islamic State jihadists killed 13.

German federal prosecutors have said they have filed terrorism charges against four men, among them three Lebanese, on allegations they supported an ultraconservative Syrian rebel organization, Ahrar al-Sham.

Prosecutors said Thursday that Lebanese nationals Kassem El R., 32 and Hassan A.S., 29, German Nuran B., 49, and Ali F., 30, who has dual Lebanese-German citizenship, have been charged with supporting a foreign terrorist organization.

The German authorities should carry out an investigation into the two-day detention of Al-Jazeera journalist Ahmed Mansour, a global rights watchdog said Wednesday.

Human Rights Watch called on German lawmakers to put pressure on their government to get answers.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II arrived in Germany Tuesday for a much anticipated state visit that also includes a trip to a former Nazi concentration camp liberated by British forces 70 years ago.

The 89-year-old queen and her husband Prince Philip, 94, touched down in her private plane for the three-day multi-stop visit, at a time when Britain is seeking support from the eurozone's top economy for its EU reform wish list.