US Defense Secretary Robert Gates denounced Thursday the online publication of more than 90,000 US military secret documents related to the war in Afghanistan by the WikiLeaks website, and said he sought the assistance of the FBI in the ongoing investigations into the issue.
"Yesterday, I called FBI Director Robert Mueller and asked for the FBI's assistance in our investigation as a partner," he told reporters at a Pentagon news briefing, adding: "It is important that we have all the resources we need to investigate and assess this breach of national security."
Noting that the release of the secret documents was "potentially severe and dangerous" to the foreign and Afghan troops battling the Taliban insurgency in the war-torn country, Gates said the leaked documents "may well damage our relationships and reputation in that key part of the world."
He indicated that the leaked documents could provide information about intelligence sources, methods and military tactics "to our adversaries." An "aggressive investigation" was launched to determine how the leaks occurred, he went on.
Gates added that the Defense Department initiated action to ensure that such damaging leaks would not recur, including steps to tighten procedures for accessing and transporting classified information.
Though WikiLeaks insisted that it took care to ensure that the release of the leaked documents "does not put innocents at harm" by holding back about 15,000 sensitive reports, it emerged later that some documents contained names, addresses and other details of many Afghan informers.
Intelligence agencies of the United States and other allied nations fighting Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan often depend upon confidential information provided by local Afghans. The disclosure of the details of those who co-operated with NATO forces in the leaked documents evoked concern over their safety.
After it emerged that the leaked documents contained details of many informers, Afghan President Hamid Karzai denounced their publication as "extremely irresponsible and shocking." He said the issue was "very serious" as it endangered the lives of the informers.
The reactions from Gates and Karzai came after WikiLeaks published online Sunday what it claimed were more than 90,000 U.S. military and diplomatic reports about Afghanistan filed between 2004 and 2009 January.
The leaked documents included damaging reports about civilian causalties in anti-Taliban operations carried out by NATO and U.S.-led coalition forces in Afghanistan, suspected acquisition of surface-to-air missiles by the Taliban and disclosures about growing evidence that showed Iran and Pakistan were supporting the Taliban insurgency.
WikiLeaks, a website that campaigns for freedom of information and frequently posts such sensitive documents online, said that it passed on the documents to the New York Times, the Guardian newspaper in London and the German magazine Der Spiegel well ahead of publishing them online.
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