Pentagon comments on "leaks" of classified documents: severe security risk
The US Department of Defence is still assessing the scale of the leak of classified information in recent weeks, which, in particular, contained information about the combat capability of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the actions of American allies.
Source: Chris Meagher, assistant to the head of the Pentagon, at a briefing on Monday, reports European Pravda with reference to CNN and Bloomberg.
According to Meagher, US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin was first informed about the "leak" on 6 April, and the next day began "convening senior leaders on a daily basis".
Over the weekend, US officials engaged with allies and partners – some of whom were also implicated in the document leak.
Meagher noted that due to the leak, "extremely secret, classified" information was made public, which poses a "very serious risk to the national security" of the United States. "These are highly classified secret materials that people in the Department of Defenсe and, of course, in other US authorities use for their work," he said.
"The Department of Defense is working around the clock to look at the scope and scale of the distribution, the assessed impact, and our mitigation measures. We're still investigating how this happened, as well as the scope of the issue.
He added that the US Department of Defence has taken steps to take a closer look at how this type of information is distributed and to whom.
Previously, in the US Department of Justice, an investigation has been launched into the leak of many documents American intelligence agencies have posted on social media in recent weeks.
The investigation began after new documents were added on Friday, covering a wide range of issues – from US support for Ukraine to information about crucial allies of the United States.
Mykhailo Podoliak, adviser to the head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, said the first batch of materials are "photoshopped", and joked about the degradation of Russian intelligence.
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