U.S. nervously awaits next WikiLeaks
The United States government and its diplomats around the world are nervously awaiting the latest release of WikiLeaks documents, more than two million, expected late Friday or Saturday.
U.S. officials said the documents may contain accounts of compromising conversations with political dissidents and friendly politicians. They also could damage U.S. relations with allies around the world and result in the expulsion of U.S. diplomats from foreign postings.
The U.S. ambassador to Canada, David Jacobson, has phoned Minister of Foreign Affairs Lawrence Cannon to inform him of the matter.
In Ottawa, Defence Minister Peter McKay said Thursday he is worried, but only if the leaked information talks about operations overseas. That kind of leak can be very dangerous, he told reporters.
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This is the third time that WikiLeaks has released secret documents. In July, it released 77,000 papers on the Afghan war. Then in October, it went public with 400,000 papers on Pentagon reports about the Iraq war.
This time WikiLeaks said the report will be on Afghanistan, Russia and other former Soviet republics, suggesting huge embarrassments, as well as classified U.S. discussions revealing corruption allegations against foreign government leaders. That's what has the U.S. extremely worried.
While no one knows what exactly the documents may reveal, speculation is that another issue that may be exposed is the pressure the U.S. put on other countries to repatriate Guantanamo Bay detainees, including Toronto-born Omar Khadr.
Recently, the Canadian government reluctantly agreed to finally bring him back to Canada after a discussion between Cannon and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.