(MintPress) – Recently released documents from the United Kingdom detail how police operatives infiltrated and spied on political activist groups for upwards of 40 years. In the documents, police chart the activities of left-wing groups and anti-capitalism organizations at the Glastonbury Festival, a popular performing arts festival. A similar scenario unraveled itself in the United States earlier this year when reports examined how the New York Police Department (NYPD) used loopholes in terror laws to spy on liberal activist groups around the country.

In February, criticisms began to emerge in the U.K. when it was discovered that undercover police officer Mark Kennedy had infiltrated environmental activist groups for seven years. The National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPOIU), which was to oversee the work of Kennedy, was criticized by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) Sir Denis O’Connor for failing to provide proper oversight for Kennedy’s work and suggesting that the infiltration was not warranted.

“The police are right to use undercover tactics in order to protect the public from serious harm. But these operations are inherently risky and must only be used when they are necessary and proportionate. NPOIU operations were not adequately controlled in this regard,” O’Connor wrote in a statement obtained by the Guardian. “HMIC found that Mark Kennedy operated outside the code of conduct for undercover officers. This suggests that NPOIU operational supervision, review and oversight were insufficient to identify that his behaviour had led to disproportionate intrusion.”

Since then, further details have emerged after a data request was fulfilled by the activist group Globalise Resistance. The information revealed that police had targeted members of the group, aggregating where they demonstrated and what causes the group was for. In the documents, police said they followed campaigns that promoted “extreme left wing (XLW)” politics and those with an “anti-capitalist nature.”

A total of seven spies from the U.K.’s Metropolitan Police Service were involved in recent spying, and the Guardian reported that all of the spies would approach groups and tout their willingness to help run the organization’s logistics. That role would provide them the opportunity gather intelligence on activists and “quietly disrupt their campaign.” Police infiltrations into the groups commonly lasted years.

The practice has spurred backlash from lawyers, who say police have crossed the line in their unfair targeting of groups based on political affiliation. It is unclear whether legal proceedings will take place at this point.

Groups decry similar treatment in US

In March, an Associated Press (AP) investigation revealed that the NYPD was using undercover officers to infiltrate liberal political organizations in order to keep logs on planned protests. David Cohen, the top intelligence officer for the NYPD, said that the spying program was designed to “determine in advance the likelihood of unlawful activity or acts of violence.”

The NYPD argued that political affiliation had nothing to do with which groups were subjected to infiltration and that the department only wanted to plan ahead so it could provide enough security to the overwhelmingly peaceful groups.

Protester Eugene Puryear told the AP that many of the peaceful protests target NYPD actions, such as allegations of police brutality and racial/ethnic profiling.

“From their perspective, they need to spy on peaceful groups so they’re not effective at putting out their peaceful message,” Puryear said. “They are threatened by anything challenging the status quo.”

Infiltrations into the groups provided police with where protests were to occur, when they were happening and what the rallies were focused on. One excerpt from the obtained documents showed specifications for the 2008 May Day demonstrations across America’s largest cities:

“May Day (May 1, 2008) rallies will be held in the following cities across the United States: San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, Boston and New York City. The rally in New York City will take place from 1200 to 1600 hours at Union Square. The rally will focus on an end to the ICE deportations of immigrant families, workplace raids taking place across the United States and the Anti-war movement.”

In 2006, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) released a report detailing how the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was investigating political organizations based on their opposition to the Iraq war. The group in focus, the Thomas Merton Center for Peace & Justice, had been under the watch of the FBI since 2002 for distributing leaflets in downtown Pittsburgh that opposed the war. The FBI’s file on the organization noted that the Merton Center “is a left-wing organization advocating, among many political causes, pacifism.”

The ACLU acknowledges researching multiple instances where the FBI or local police agencies have monitored activist groups based solely on their anti-war views, religious beliefs and stances on environmental issues. Jim Kleissler, Executive Director of the Merton Center, told the ACLU that he couldn’t fathom why the FBI would use resources on a group promoting peace and pacifism.

“It makes no sense that the FBI would be spying on peace activists handing out flyers,” he said. “Our members were simply offering leaflets to passersby, legally and peacefully, and now they’re being investigated by a counter-terrorism unit. Something is seriously wrong in how our government determines who and what constitutes terrorism when peace activists find themselves targeted.”

Liberal groups have drawn the watchful eye of the FBI since the 1950s. From 1956 to 1971, the FBI launched its Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO), which was created to “disrupt” and “neutralize” particular groups that were deemed a potential threat to society. The program targeted groups such as the “Communist Party, USA,” the “Socialist Workers Party” and the “New Left.”