Sibel Edmonds Testifies Before Congress for First Time Today

[G_j]

FBI Whistleblower Sibel Edmonds Testifies Before Congress for First Time Today

March 2, 2005

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: [e-mail]

Edmonds Speaks at House Hearing on "Excessive Classification"

WASHINGTON - Sibel Edmonds, who was fired after exposing national security concerns at the FBI, will testify before Congress for the first time today. The American Civil Liberties Union is representing Edmonds in her appeal to reinstate her case against the government.

"Sibel Edmonds' case shows how the government has abused secrecy to shield itself from embarrassment and accountability," said Ann Beeson, Associate Legal Director of the ACLU. "Preventing these serious allegations from coming to light will make us less safe, not more."

Edmonds, a former Middle Eastern language specialist for the FBI, will share her story with members of the House Committee on Government Reform’s Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations. The hearing will focus on the emerging threats of over-classification and pseudo-classification. Edmonds will testify about the government's excessive use of classification to cover up its own misconduct in her case. Henry Waxman, a California Democrat and the ranking minority member on the House Committee on Government Reform, asked Edmonds to testify at today’s hearing.

The hearing comes on the heels of a Justice Department decision last week to make public information about Edmonds’ case that it had previously retroactively classified. The information has gone through a series of classification flip-flops that started in May 2004, when the department retroactively classified information about Edmonds' case that the FBI had provided to Congress in public briefings.

Edmonds, hired by the FBI shortly after 9/11, was fired after reporting shoddy translation work and national security breaches within the agency. She challenged her retaliatory dismissal by filing a law suit in federal court, but her case was dismissed last July after Attorney General John Ashcroft invoked the so-called "state secrets privilege." The Justice Department apparently decided to retroactively classify the Congressional briefings not to protect national security but to bolster its "state secrets" claim.

An executive summary of the Justice Department’s Inspector General report into her termination concluded that Edmonds was fired for reporting the misconduct, and that such treatment would discourage federal employees from speaking up about potential security risks.

The ACLU said that the Edmonds case is part of a larger pattern by the government to silence employees who expose national security blunders. Coleen Rowley, Manny Johnson, Robert Woo, Ray McGovern, Mel Goodman, Bogdan Dzakovic, and Mike German are just a few of the other national security whistleblowers who were vilified and retaliated against.

Edmonds’ testimony is online at http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=17606&c=281.

For a web feature on the Edmonds case and more information on national security whistleblowers, go to http://www.aclu.org/whistleblower

[G_j]

1. Still Trying to Silence Sibel

http://www.antiwar.com/blog/index.php?id=P1861

Still Trying to Silence Sibel

Sibel Edmonds, the heroic FBI contract translator - turned - whistle blower, despite the Department of Justice dropping their attempted application of the "state secrets privilege" to silence her last week, is now up against the same tactic with a different name.

According to John Files at the New York Times:

"The government has told a federal appeals court that a suit by an F.B.I. translator who was fired after accusing the bureau of ineptitude should not be allowed to proceed because it would cause 'significant damage to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.'

Lawyers for the government said in a brief filed with the court on Thursday that the suit could not continue without disclosing privileged and classified information."

This apparently means, "If we let her tell you what she knows, we might be in trouble."
Sibel Edmonds' Website
My interview of her (mp3)

Posted by: Scott Horton on Feb 26, 05 | 8:56 pm

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http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/022605Y.shtml

Justice Dept. Opposes Bid to Revive Case against F.B.I.
By John Files
The New York Times

Saturday 26 February 2005

Washington - The government has told a federal appeals court that a suit by an F.B.I. translator who was fired after accusing the bureau of ineptitude should not be allowed to proceed because it would cause "significant damage to the national security and foreign policy of the United States."

Lawyers for the government said in a brief filed with the court on Thursday that the suit could not continue without disclosing privileged and classified information.

The translator, Sibel Edmonds, was a contract linguist for the bureau for about six months, translating material in Azerbaijani, Farsi and Turkish. Ms. Edmonds was dismissed in 2002 after complaining repeatedly that bureau linguists had produced slipshod and incomplete translations of important terrorism intelligence before and after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Ms. Edmonds also accused a fellow Turkish linguist in the Washington field office of blocking the translation of material involving acquaintances who had come under suspicion and said the bureau had allowed diplomatic sensitivities with other nations to affect the translation of important intelligence.

..more..

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[Mandate My Ass]

2. They may actually have a point here

It would be bad for national security to have a whistleblower point out how compromised, corrupt and slipshod our intelligence gathering apparatus is.

[Disturbed]

3. Classifyng documents that were public is absurd.

This is an important case. There is still hope that the Bush Junta cannot entirely nueter all of the Constitution &/or The Bill of Rights.

[Mandate My Ass]

4. I agree-I was trying to be flippant

and apparently I missed the mark.

I think her testimony would shine the light of truth on whose failure it truly was to protect us on 9/11. I bet it would be a different answer than the 9/11 commission came up with.

[G_j]

5. & she contradicts Bush admin testimony

before the 9/11 Committee, and they testified under oath. We'll have to see if the Gonzales DOJ can continue to squash this.