Letter from Margaret P. Grafeld, DOS to Amrit Singh, ACLU re: the ACLU's FOIA Request. The letter states that the document production requested is being complied with in some parts and denied or withheld in part.
United States Department of State
Washington, D.C. 20520
rEC 17 2004
Case No. 200303827
Segment L016
Ms. Amrit. Singh
American Civil Liberties Union Foundation
125 Broad Street, 18th Floor
New York, NY 10004-2400
Dear Ms. Singh:
I refer to our previous correspondence regarding the release
of certain Department of State material you had requested
under the Freedom of Information Act (Title 5 USC Section
552) in your letters of October 7, 2003 and May 25, 2004.
We have retrieved 98 additional documents from the Office of
Legal Adviser which we have grouped as Segment L016. After
reviewing these documents, we have determined that five may
be released in full, one may be released with excisions, and
43 may not be released. The released documents are enclosed.
A decision on five documents requires interagency
coordination. We will inform you when we receive the results
of that coordination. Forty-four documents originated with
other government agencies and have been referred to those
agencies for review and direct reply to you.
Material in the document released in part and in 23 of the
documents withheld in full is currently and properly
classified under Executive Order 12958 in the interest of
national defense or foreign relations. As such, it is
exempt from release under subsection (b)(1) of the Freedom
of Information Act.
Information in 27 of the documents withheld in full is exempt
from release under subsection (b)(5) of the Freedom of
Information Act because it is protected by the deliberative
process privilege, attorney client privilege, attorney work
product privilege, and/or another privilege incorporated by
subsection (b)(5).
DOS-001302
In some cases, two or more exemptions apply to the same
document. In the case of a document released in part, all
non-exempt material that is reasonably segregable from the
exempt material has been released.
Sincerely,
Margaret P. Grafeld Director Office of Information Programs and Services
Enclosures: As stated.
DOS-001303