Marc Flemming
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US President George W. Bush attacked as "disgraceful" the public disclosure of a secret government program to monitor international finances and track down terrorist funding.
"Congress was briefed, and what we did was fully authorized under the law. and the disclosure of this program is disgraceful," Bush told reporters in the wake of last week's revelations of the roughly five-year-old program.
"We're at war with a bunch of people who want to hurt the United States of America. And for people to leak that program, and for a newspaper to publish it, does great harm to the United States of America," he said.
Several US newspapers reported Friday that the US government had secretly monitored thousands of international banking transactions since the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington in order to track suspected terrorists.
The searches involved millions of records held by the Belgium-based Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), an international cooperative that serves as a clearing house for the transactions.
The cooperative serves 7,800 financial institutions in more than 200 countries. Its database, officials say, has provided valuable information about ties between suspected terrorists and groups financing them, and directly led to the capture of Al-Qaeda operative Riduan Isamuddin, believed to have masterminded the 2002 bombings in Bali, Indonesia.
Officials say it has also helped identify a US man convicted of helping an Al-Qaeda member launder 200,000 dollars through a Pakistani bank.
"What we were doing was the right thing. Congress was aware of it, and we were within the law to do so," said Bush. "If you want to figure out what the terrorists are doing, you try to follow their money. And that's exactly what we're doing.
"And the fact that a newspaper disclosed it makes it harder to win this war on terror," said Bush.
Meanwhile, a high-ranking US Republican demanded a criminal prosecution of The New York Times following the newspaper's disclosure of a secret government operation to monitor international finances.
Representative Peter King of New York, chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, called the actions of the leading US newspaper "disgraceful" and said he believed it had violated counterespionage laws.
"The New York Times is putting its own arrogant, elitist, left-wing agenda before the interests of the American people," the lawmaker said as he appeared on the "Fox News Sunday" television program.
"And I'm calling on the attorney general to begin a criminal investigation and prosecution of the New York Times, its reporters, the editors that worked on this, and the publisher," he stressed.
Officials say it has also helped identify a US man convicted of helping an Al-Qaeda member launder 200,000 dollars through a Pakistani bank.
King said The Times had "compromised America's antiterrorist policies" for the second time in less that a year.
Last December, the paper published a report saying that Bush had authorized the National Security Agency to listen in to thousands of telephone calls made by Americans without a warrant issued by a special counterintelligence court.
That disclosure had also prompted charges that the paper was undermining US national security.
"The time has come for the American people to realize and The New York Times to realize we're at war and they can't be just on their own deciding what to declassify, what to release," King argued.
The appeal, however, was met with skepticism by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, who said lawmakers needed to learn more about the operation before any action is taken.
"I think it's premature to call for a prosecution of the New York Times, just like I think it's premature to say that the administration is entirely correct," he argued.
Rights groups have criticized the Bush administration for the sweeping surveillance of telephone calls and financial transactions, accusing it of trampling on civil liberties and legal safeguards.
The New York Times has confirmed that the White House asked it not to run the story but defended its coverage of both the banking and the NSA controversies.
"We believe The Times and others in the press have served the public interest by accurately reporting on these programs so that the public can have an informed view of them," executive editor Bill Keller said in a letter to readers Sunday.
Source: AFP |
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06-26-2006 08:45 PM
