Cable 09STATE80163: 'Reporting and Collection Needs: The United Nations'

Cable 09STATE80163 was sent from Washington on 31 July 2009, classified Secret/NoForn and issued under Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's name. It transmitted the full text of a new National HUMINT Collection Directive on the United Nations, replacing one from 2004, setting out priority issues – from Darfur, Afghanistan, Somalia, Iran and North Korea to Security Council reform, peacekeeping and UN management – and the information US agencies wished to gather on each.

Alongside policy questions, the directive sought 'Personalities, biographic and biometric information' on key UN officials, including under-secretaries, heads of specialised agencies, senior aides to the Secretary-General and heads of peace operations. Under telecommunications it asked for technical details of networks used by top officials, including 'passwords, personal encryption keys'. It also asked State Department reporting officers to pass on biographic details such as e-mail addresses, credit card account numbers and frequent flyer account numbers.

The directive lists the agencies participating in the collection effort, among them the CIA's Clandestine Service, the FBI and the US Secret Service. The Guardian reported that it was sent to US missions to the UN in New York, Vienna and Rome and to 33 embassies and consulates.

I released the cable on 28 November 2010, the first day of Cablegate, and the Guardian reported it that day under the headline 'US diplomats spied on UN leadership'. The State Department spokesman, P.J. Crowley, told the Guardian that US diplomats 'do not engage in intelligence activities'.

The cable belongs to the Cablegate archive for which Chelsea Manning was convicted in 2013; the US government has not individually authenticated it.