[104-10337-10014.pdf — page 48]
# FINAL REPORT OF THE ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARDrecords was its belief that the FBI's evidence did not enumerate specific harms that would result from disclosure.A. The FBI's May 1996 Appeals to the President. On May 10 and 28, 1996, the FBI appealed to the President to overturn the Board's vote on 17 records relating to the FBI's surveillance of officials and establishments of four Communist countries-the Soviet Union, Cuba, Czechoslovakia, and Poland-during the 1960s. The FBI's overarching arguments were that disclosure of the information would reveal sensitive sources and methods that would compromise the national security of the United States, and that disclosure of the targets of the surveillance the four Communist countries-would harm the foreign relations of the United States.The FBI sought to postpone five types of source and method capabilities: tracing of funds, physical surveillance (lookout logs), mail cover, electronic surveillance, and typewriter and fingerprint identification. The Review Board's response briefs to the President dealt with each source or method in turn. Specific details regarding the appeal of each issue are discussed below.In response to the FBI's overarching argument that disclosure of the information would reveal sensitive sources and methods and compromise the national security, the Review Board responded that if the national security would be harmed by release of this information, the harm would have already occurred, since the FBI had already released both the identities of the target countries and the sources and methods that the FBI used in its operations.In response to the FBI's arguments that disclosure of the targets of the surveillance would harm the foreign relations of the United States, the Review Board responded in three parts. First, the information that the FBI sought to protect is widely available in the public domain, from both official government sources and secondary sources, so if foreign relations are harmed by disclosure of the information, then the harm has already occurred. Second, the FBI simply did not prove its argument that it may have violated international law or "diplomatic standards"by employing the sources or methods at issue since the FBI did not cite the laws or treaties to which it referred and the Review Board could not locate any laws or treaties that were in effect at the time that the records were created. Third, despite the FBI's assertion to the contrary, the Review Board had evidence that other governments do acknowledge that, in past years, they conducted foreign counterintelligence operations against other countries.The Review Board believed that the FBI had not provided evidence of a "significant, demonstrable harm" to current foreign relations or intelligence work. Thus, the Board asked the President to deny the FBI's requests for postponement. The White House did not expressly rule on the appeals. Instead, after several meetings involving representatives from the Review Board, the FBI, and the White House, the White House directed the FBI to provide the Review Board with specific evidence in support of its postponements. The White House requested the Review Board to reconsider the Bureau's specific evidence. The FBI, in turn, withdrew the first two of its pending appeals, including some records in which the Review Board voted to release information obtained from a technical source.B. Post-appeal decisionmaking. After further negotiations, the Review Board and the FBI agreed to release most information regarding its foreign counterintelligence activities against Communist Bloc countries as "consent releases." In those few cases where the Bureau believed that foreign counterintelligence activity against Communist Bloc countries still required protection, the Bureau submitted for the Board's determination postponement-specific evidence.To the extent that the information in the FBI's proposed redaction did not meaningfully contribute to the understanding of the assassination, the Review Board allowed the FBI to postpone direct discussions of foreign counterintelligence activities against non-Communist Bloc countries. With regard to the FBI's "segregated collections," the Review Board stated in its segreated collection guidelines,It is presumed that the FBI will, at least partially, carry over its post-appeal stan-