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Conservative Judicial Watch group suit denied as appeals court says US government right to classify pictures
A federal appeals court ruled on Tuesday that the US government had properly classified as top secret more than 50 images of the al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden that were taken after his death, and that the government did not need to release them.
The unanimous ruling by three judges on the US court of appeals for the District of Columbia circuit rejected a request for the images made by a conservative nonprofit watchdog group. Judicial Watch sued for photographs and video from the May 2011 raid in which US special forces killed Bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan. The organization's lawsuit relied on the Freedom of Information Act, a 1966 law that guarantees public access to some government documents.
In an unsigned opinion, the appeals court accepted an assertion from President Barack Obama's administration that the images are so potent that releasing them could cause riots that would put Americans abroad at risk.
"It is undisputed that the government is withholding the images not to shield wrongdoing or avoid embarrassment, but rather to prevent the killing of Americans and violence against American interests," the opinion said. The court ruled that the risk of violence justified the decision to classify the images top secret, and that the CIA may withhold the images under an exception to the Freedom of Information Act for documents that are classified.
Judicial Watch did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokeswoman for the Justice Department, which represents the Obama administration in court, had no immediate comment.
The images show a dead Bin Laden at his compound in Pakistan, the transportation of his body to a US ship and his burial at sea, the government has said. Some of the photographs were taken so the CIA could conduct facial recognition analysis to confirm the body's identity, according to court papers.
