|
US denies al-Qaeda video leak
10/10/2007 07:27 - (SA)
Washington - The Bush administration on Tuesday denied leaking an Osama bin Laden video obtained by a private terrorism monitoring group which said the leak had exposed its surveillance methods and potentially closed a
window on al-Qaeda.
Private monitoring firm SITE Institute said in a Washington
Post article that its years-long efforts to monitor al-Qaeda
communications had been set back after government agencies
prematurely leaked to the media a pre-release video of Bin
Laden last month.
"Techniques that took years to develop are now ineffective
and worthless," SITE founder Rita Katz told the Post.
A SITE spokesperson confirmed the company's views as described
in the article but declined to elaborate.
Leak denied
The White House denied it had leaked the video but said the
issue was a cause for concern and an investigation would be
needed to determine what happened. The office of the Director
of National Intelligence said US intelligence agencies were
not involved.
"To make the accusation that the intelligence community
leaked this to the media is totally false," intelligence office
spokesperson Ross Feinstein said.
Asked if the government's ability to monitor al-Qaeda communications had been compromised, he said, "We have the appropriate people and the appropriate methods."
At issue was a video from Bin Laden, his first video appearance in three years, that was prepared for the sixth anniversary of the September 11 attacks.
An Islamist website had announced the video on September 7,
and a few hours later US government officials said they had
obtained a copy of the video and were analysing it.
SITE said in the Post article that it had obtained the
video ahead of its planned al-Qaeda release and given two
senior Bush administration officials access to it on condition
they not reveal they had it until the official release.
Access to secret network blocked
But government computers were quickly used to download the
video from SITE computers, and a video and transcript of the
video were leaked to news outlets by people within the
government, SITE told the Post.
The article cited Katz as saying al-Qaeda supporters,
alerted by the leak, then put up new obstacles that blocked
SITE from accessing their secret network.
White House Homeland Security Adviser Fran Townsend told
reporters the US government needs help from private firms and
individuals to fight terrorism. "So any time an individual or a
commercial entity co-operates with us, and asks to be protected
and doesn't get the protection that they either sought or
deserved, that's a cause for concern," she said.
|
News
