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Anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks has claimed that the US National Security Agency has been actively recording almost every phone call in Afghanistan.
According to The Verge, the recordings are being made as part of the same program that was reported earlier this week to be capturing nearly every call in the Bahamas, as well as phone records from Mexico, Kenya, and the Philippines.
The Intercept, a media organization, with direct access to leaked documents by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, had refrained from listing the name of Afghanistan saying that it decided to withhold it in response to specific, credible concerns that doing so could incite further violence in the region.
Meanwhile, WikiLeaks disclosed the name of the country saying that an ongoing crime of mass espionage was being committed.
WikiLeaks slammed the US government's claim that disclosure may lead to increase in violence and said that similar reasoning was given by the government in the past, adding that never has such ill effects been witnessed in the aftermath of a disclosure.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange wrote that WikiLeaks has years of experience with such false or overstated claims made by US officials in their attempts to delay or deny publication.
He added that to this day WikiLeaks was not aware of any evidence provided by any government agency that any of its eight million publications have resulted in harm to life.
