NEW YORK, Dec 20: The Federal Bureau of Investigation has conducted numerous surveillance and intelligence-gathering operations that involved, at least indirectly, groups active in causes as diverse as the environment, animal cruelty and poverty relief, said the New York Times on Tuesday, quoting newly disclosed agency records.

FBI officials told the newspaper that their investigators had no interest in monitoring political or social activities and that any investigations that touched on advocacy groups were driven by evidence of criminal or violent activity in public settings.

After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, John Ashcroft, who was then attorney-general, loosened restrictions on the FBI’s investigative powers, giving the bureau greater ability to visit and monitor websites, mosques and other public entities in developing terrorism leads. The bureau has used that authority to investigate not only groups with suspected ties to foreign terrorists, but also protest groups suspected of having links to violent or disruptive activities.

But the documents, coming after the administration’s confirmation that President Bush had authorized some spying without warrants in fighting terrorism, prompted charges from civil rights advocates that the government had improperly blurred the line between terrorism and acts of civil disobedience and lawful protest, the newspaper said.

The Times said one FBI document indicates that agents in Indianapolis planned to conduct surveillance as part of a ‘Vegan Community Project’. Another document talks of the Catholic Workers group’s ‘semi-communistic ideology’. A third indicates the bureau’s interest in determining the location of a protest by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.