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CIA

Secrecy News laments lack of accountability in denying information

donal brown October 10, 2011

Some argue that if government classifiers were required to justify their classifications with clear, precise written explanation, there would be less information consigned to secrecy, writes Steven Aftergood for Secrecy News. As of now, officials get away with saying “it is secret because it’s secret,” but Aftergood thinks that it is not enough to require explanation, that establishing a review process would do more to achieve greater transparency. -db From a commentary in Secrecy News,

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Drone strikes out in open but still classified and not subject to discussion

donal brown October 10, 2011

When a U.S. drone strike killed a U.S. citizen in Yemen who was a prominent al Qaeda terrorist, President Barack Obama would not acknowledge the obvious – that a drone had done the task or that the C.I.A. was involved. Nor would the Obama administration provide the public with details on the policy behind an execution of an American citizen without due process. -db From a commentary in The New York Times, October 4, 2011,

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Council of Europe criticizes U.S. ‘cult of secrecy’

donal brown September 8, 2011

The inter-parliamentary  Council of Europe has issued a draft resolution blasting the U.S. for its “cult of secrecy” and said whistleblowers played a vital tole in challenging government secrecy. The resolution pointed up the ill effects of secrecy, “In some countries, in particular the United States, the notion of state secrecy is used to shield agents of the executive from prosecution for serious criminal offenses such as abduction and torture, or to stop victims from

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Court rules no contempt in CIA destruction of video of interrogations

donal brown August 4, 2011

A federal judge criticized the CIA for ignoring a court order asking the agency to preserve videos of interrogations but did not hold it in contempt. The American Civil Liberties Union had brought the contempt motion in ACLU v. Department of Defense, a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit begun in 2004. An ACLU spokesperson said, “Yet again, the CIA will get away with denying the public of the best evidence of torture.” -db From The

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Blogger files lawsuit to discover if government maintains file on him

donal brown July 14, 2011

A University of Michigan professor, Juan Cole, who suspects he was under investigation by the federal government for his blogs on Mideast issues, is filing a lawsuit to force the government to release any files on him. The lawsuit came about after a former CIA official said his superiors asked what he knew about Cole and what he could find that would discredit him. ACLU attorney Zachary Katznelson says the lawsuit is to determine “whether

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