[Dialogue] Another XMAS gift from George W.

Tue Dec 20 13:40:27 EST 2005

 
 (http://www.nytimes.com/) New York Times, December 20,  2005 
F.B.I. Watched Activist Groups, New Files Show  
By _ERIC  LICHTBLAU_ 
(http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=ERIC%20LICHTBLAU&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=ERIC%20LICHTBLAU&inline=nyt
-per)  
WASHINGTON, Dec. 19 - Counterterrorism agents  at the Federal Bureau of 
Investigation have conducted numerous surveillance and  intelligence-gathering 
operations that involved, at least indirectly, groups  active in causes as diverse 
as the environment, animal cruelty and poverty  relief, newly disclosed 
agency records show. 
F.B.I. officials said Monday that  their investigators had no interest in 
monitoring political or social activities  and that any investigations that 
touched on advocacy groups were driven by  evidence of criminal or violent activity 
at public protests and in other  settings. 
After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, _John Ashcroft_ 
(http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/a/john_ashcroft/index.html?inline=nyt-per) 
, who was then attorney general, loosened  restrictions on the F.B.I.'s 
investigative powers, giving the bureau greater  ability to visit and monitor Web 
sites, mosques and other public entities in  developing terrorism leads. The 
bureau has used that authority to investigate  not only groups with suspected 
ties to foreign terrorists, but also protest  groups suspected of having links 
to violent or disruptive  activities. 
But the documents, coming after the  Bush administration's confirmation that 
President Bush had authorized some  spying without warrants in fighting 
terrorism, prompted charges from civil  rights advocates that the government had 
improperly blurred the line between  terrorism and acts of civil disobedience and 
lawful  protest. 
One F.B.I. document indicates that  agents in Indianapolis planned to conduct 
surveillance as  part of a "Vegan Community Project." Another document talks 
of the Catholic  Workers group's "semi-communistic ideology." A third 
indicates the bureau's  interest in determining the location of a protest over llama 
fur planned by  People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. 
The documents, provided to The New  York Times over the past week, came as 
part of a series of Freedom of  Information Act lawsuits brought by the American 
Civil Liberties Union. For more  than a year, the A.C.L.U. has been seeking 
access to information in F.B.I. files  on about 150 protest and social groups 
that it says may have been improperly  monitored.  
The F.B.I. had previously turned  over a small number of documents on antiwar 
groups, showing the agency's  interest in investigating possible anarchist or 
violent links in connection with  antiwar protests and demonstrations in 
advance of the 2004 political  conventions. And earlier this month, the A.C.L.U.'s 
Colorado chapter released  similar documents involving, among other things, 
people protesting logging  practices at a lumber industry gathering in 2002. 
The latest batch of documents,  parts of which the A.C.L.U. plans to release 
publicly on Tuesday, totals more  than 2,300 pages and centers on references 
in internal files to a handful of  groups, including PETA, the environmental 
group Greenpeace and the Catholic  Workers group, which promotes antipoverty 
efforts and social causes.   
Many of the investigative documents  turned over by the bureau are heavily 
edited, making it difficult or impossible  to determine the full context of the 
references and why the F.B.I. may have been  discussing events like a PETA 
protest. F.B.I. officials say many of the  references may be much more benign 
than they seem to civil rights advocates,  adding that the documents offer an 
incomplete and sometimes misleading snapshot  of the bureau's activities. 
"Just being referenced in an F.B.I.  file is not tantamount to being the 
subject of an investigation," said John  Miller, a spokesman for the bureau.  
"The F.B.I. does not target  individuals or organizations for investigation 
based on their political  beliefs," Mr. Miller said. "Everything we do is 
carefully promulgated by federal  law, Justice Department guidelines and the 
F.B.I.'s own  rules." 
A.C.L.U officials said the latest  batch of documents released by the F.B.I. 
indicated the agency's interest in a  broader array of activist and protest 
groups than they had previously thought.  In light of other recent disclosures 
about domestic surveillance activities by  the National Security Agency and 
military intelligence units, the A.C.L.U. said  the documents reflected a pattern 
of overreaching by the Bush  administration. 
"It's clear that this  administration has engaged every possible agency, from 
the Pentagon to N.S.A. to  the F.B.I., to engage in spying on Americans," 
said Ann Beeson, associate legal  director for the A.C.L.U.  
"You look at these documents," Ms.  Beeson said, "and you think, wow, we have 
really returned to the days of J.  Edgar Hoover, when you see in F.B.I. files 
that they're talking about a group  like the Catholic Workers league as 
having a communist ideology."   
The documents indicate that in some  cases, the F.B.I. has used employees, 
interns and other confidential informants  within groups like PETA and 
Greenpeace to develop leads on potential criminal  activity and has downloaded material 
from the groups' Web sites, in addition to  monitoring their protests.  
In the case of Greenpeace, which is  known for highly publicized acts of 
civil disobedience like the boarding of  cargo ships to unfurl protest banners, 
the files indicate that the F.B.I.  investigated possible financial ties between 
its members and militant groups  like the Earth Liberation Front and the 
Animal Liberation  Front. 
These networks, which have no  declared leaders and are only loosely 
organized, have been described by the  F.B.I. in Congressional testimony as "extremist 
special interest groups" whose  cells engage in violent or other illegal 
acts, making them "a serious domestic  terrorist threat."  
In testimony last year, John E.  Lewis, deputy assistant director of the 
counterterrorism division, said the  F.B.I. estimated that in the past 10 years 
such groups had engaged in more than  1,000 criminal acts causing more than $100 
million in  damage. 
When the F.B.I. investigates  evidence of possible violence or criminal 
disruptions at protests and other  events, those investigations are routinely 
handled by agents within the bureau's  counterterrorism division.  
But the groups mentioned in the  newly disclosed F.B.I. files questioned both 
the propriety of characterizing  such investigations as related to 
"terrorism" and the necessity of diverting  counterterrorism personnel from more 
pressing investigations.   
"The fact that we're even mentioned  in the F.B.I. files in connection with 
terrorism is really troubling," said Tom  Wetterer, general counsel for 
Greenpeace. "There's no property damage or  physical injury caused in our activities, 
and under any definition of terrorism,  we'd take issue with that." 
Jeff Kerr, general counsel for  PETA, rejected the suggestion in some F.B.I. 
files that the animal rights group  had financial ties to militant groups, and 
said he, too, was troubled by his  group's inclusion in the files. 
"It's shocking and it's outrageous," Mr.  Kerr said. "And to me, it's an 
abuse of power by the F.B.I. when groups like  Greenpeace and PETA are basically 
being punished for their social  activism."  

Cynthia N.  Vance
Strategics International Inc.
8245 SW 116 Terrace
Miami, Florida,  33156
305-378-1327; fax  305-378-9178
http://members.aol.com/facilitationfla
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://wedgeblade.net/pipermail/dialogue_wedgeblade.net/attachments/20051220/100c46f2/attachment.htm