HUNDREDS of Afghan lives have been put at risk by the leaking of 90,000 intelligence documents to WikiLeaks because the files identify informants working with NATO forces.
In just two hours of searching the WikiLeaks archive, The Times found the names of dozens of Afghans credited with providing detailed intelligence to US forces. Their villages are given for identification and also, in many cases, their fathers’ names.
US officers recorded detailed logs of the information fed to them by named local informants, particularly tribal elders.
Julian Assange, the Australian founder of WikiLeaks, claimed on Monday that all the documents released through his organisation had been checked for named informants and that 15,000 such documents had been held back.
The Afghan Government has reacted with horror to the volume of information contained in the files.
A senior official at the Afghan Foreign Ministry, who declined to be named, said: “The leaks certainly have put in real risk and danger the lives and integrity of many Afghans. The US is both morally and legally responsible for any harm that the leaks might cause to the individuals, particularly those who have been named. It will further limit the US/international access to the uncensored views of Afghans.”
The Pentagon claimed that a preliminary review of the thousands of secret reports released by WikiLeaks showed that they posed no immediate threat to US forces. But experts warned that the Taliban and al-Qa’ida would already be using the information to identify and target informers in the war zone.
Robert Riegle, a former senior intelligence officer, said: “It’s possible that someone could get killed in the next few days.”
Michael Hayden, a former director of the CIA, said that militants would be able to find out “who was in the room” for the planning of specific operations, and then “would probably punish the traitor”.
The potential human cost of the leaks has added to pressure on the Pentagon to find ways to keep its secrets contained, and on the White House to revise an Afghan strategy that is increasingly seen as failing.
Among the documents is a report from 2008 that includes a detailed interview with a Taliban fighter considering defection. He is named, with both his father’s name and village included. There is also detailed intelligence on other Taliban fighters and commanders in his area. The Times has withheld all details that would identify the man.
The man names local Taliban commanders and talks about other potential defectors. “The meeting ended with [X] agreeing to meet with intel personnel from the battalion,” the report reads. It is not known whether the man subsequently left the Taliban.
In other documents, named Afghans offered information accusing others of being Taliban. In one case from 2007, a senior official accuses named figures in the government of corruption. In another from 2007, a report describes using a middleman to talk to an alleged Taliban commander who is identified.
“[X] said that he would be killed if he got caught interacting with any coalition forces, which is why he hides when we go into [Y],” the report reads.
In another report, American officers negotiate with a named Taliban fighter through the man’s brother and uncle. In all cases the dates and precise locations of the reports are included.
Mr Assange, appearing at the Frontline Club in London last nigh, said: “We held back 15,000 reports not because we viewed that they would be any threat to Western forces in Afghanistan but rather because some of them, a very, very few number, mentioned the names of local Afghanis that might have been subject to retribution. We’re not sure yet but we decided to pause.”
He claimed that WikiLeaks had implemented a “harm-minimisation policy” to weed out documents that could endanger the lives of Afghans.
When pressed by a lawyer in the audience on whether WikiLeaks had the expertise to apply such a policy, Mr Assange said: “We have read more leaked documents than any other organisation that’s not a spy agency on earth. If someone can apply this policy surely we can do it.”
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