FBI Meets with Muslims to Dispel Concerns Over Surveillance Reports

January 12, 2006

Source: Prison Planet/The New York Times

http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/january2006/120106triestodispel.htm

On January 12, 2006 The New York Times reported, "F.B.I. officials met with Muslim and Arab-American leaders on Wednesday in an effort to dispel anger and concern over the bureau's secret monitoring of radiation levels at Muslim sites around the country.

John Pistole, deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and John Miller, the bureau's assistant director of public affairs, tried to reassure those at the session that the surveillance of mosques and Muslim businesses and homes had been based on intelligence leads... F.B.I. officials struck a conciliatory tone, several attendees said, and acknowledged that the bureau could have responded to their concerns more quickly. But Mr. Pistole offered few details on the monitoring, they said, and he emphasized that the program, which began after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and lasted through 2003, remained classified... The controversy over the surveillance program comes after the F.B.I. cancelled financing for a bureau-wide training initiative intended to improve outreach to Muslim and Arab Americans. Group leaders say the news about the radiation monitoring makes such a program all the more crucial."