Wikileaks release reveals ‘private lies of private spies’

Wikileaks has begun publishing a huge number of emails from US intelligence firm Stratfor in a move the anti-secrecy website said revealed the “private lies of private spies”.

Wikileaks claims that over 5m emails from the company will uncover “everything from sinister spy tactics to an insider trading scheme with Goldman Sachs” in the coming weeks.

Texas-based Stratfor, which describes itself as a “subscription-based provider of geopolitical analysis,” denounced the theft of the emails as “a deplorable, unfortunate — and illegal — breach of privacy”.

The batch released yesterday suggests that Dow Chemical, parent company of the firm responsible for the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy, paid Stratfor to monitor campaigners for victims of the disaster, Wikileaks claims.

The website said emails indicated that Coca-Cola paid Stratfor to investigate the animal rights group Peta.

A “substantial” proportion of Stratfor’s funding comes from government agencies including the US Department of Homeland Security, Wikileaks said, while adding that it could not yet give exact figures.

Wikileaks is sifting through the emails, dating from July 2004 to Dec 2011, with 25 media partners including Rolling Stone magazine and Italy’s La Repubblica newspaper, while the public can also view the messages.

The emails document “the private lives and private lies of private spies”, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange said.

“Over the last ten years the private intelligence industry has boomed in the US and other countries.”

Stratfor, founded in 1996, slammed the publication of the emails but said it would not comment on their content.