WASHINGTON, Dec. 20 (Xinhuanet) -- The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has conducted numerous surveillance and intelligence-gathering operations that involved groups active in environment, animal cruelty and poverty relief and other causes, newly disclosed agency records showed.

    After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, then Attorney General John Ashcroft loosened restrictions on the FBI's investigative powers, giving the bureau greater ability to visit and monitor Web sites, mosques and other public entities in developing terrorism leads, The New York Times reported Tuesday.

    The FBI has used the authority to investigate not only groups with suspected ties to foreign tourists, but also protest groups suspected of having links to violent or disruptive activities, the report said.

    The documents, coming after the Bush administration's confirmation that President George W. 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 report said.

    Most of the investigative documents turned over by the FBI were heavily edited, making it difficult to determine the full context of the reference, according to the report.

    FBI officials said their investigations had no intent in monitoring political or social activities and that any investigations that touched on advocacy groups were driven by evidence of criminal or violent activities at public protest and in other settings.

    But officials of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said the latest batch of documents released by the FBI indicated the agency's interest in a broader array of activist and protest groups than they had previously thought.

    "It is clear that this administration has engaged every possible agency ... to engage in spying on Americans," Ann Beeson, associate legal director of the ACLU, was quoted as saying. Enditem