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Thursday, June 21, 2012

Executioner-In-Chief Rejects ACLU and NY Times Requests For "Kill List" Info


"Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this Presidency"

  WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Obama administration has rejected requests from The New York Times and the American Civil Liberties Union seeking information about its "targeted killing" program against suspected terrorists, saying the release of the requested documents would harm national security.

Under the Freedom of Information Act, the Times and the ACLU sought records regarding the legal justifications for the alleged U.S. government killing of U.S. citizens and others associated with al-Qaida and other terrorist groups.

In a court document filed late Wednesday in New York in response to an ACLU lawsuit, the Justice Department said that "even to describe the numbers and details of most of these documents would reveal information that could damage the government's counterterrorism efforts."

The administration said the information requested is "highly classified," even though details of such operations have been leaked to the media.

"For example, whether or not the United States government conducted the particular operations that led to the deaths of Anwar al-Awlaki and the other individuals named in the FOIA requests remains classified," the government wrote. The U.S.-born al-Awlaki, an al-Qaida leader, was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Yemen in September.

"Likewise, whether or not the CIA has the authority to be, or is in fact, directly involved in targeted lethal operations remains classified," the government wrote.

In response to the government filing, ACLU Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer said Thursday: "The notion that the CIA's targeted killing program is still a secret is beyond absurd. Senior officials have discussed it, both on the record and off."

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