The FBI arrested a 21-year-old member of the Massachusetts Air Nationwide Guard as a part of an investigation into the leak of extremely labeled US intelligence paperwork.

Legal professional-general Merrick Garland recognized the suspect as Jack Teixeira in a short assertion to reporters on Thursday. “FBI brokers took Teixeira into custody earlier this afternoon with out incident,” Garland stated, including that he would seem in federal court docket in Massachusetts.

Greater than 100 labeled paperwork have been leaked on social media, beginning on the messaging platform Discord, a few of which have been printed on Telegram and Twitter final week. They largely deal with the warfare in Ukraine but additionally embrace info intercepted by the US from allies together with South Korea and Israel.

President Joe Biden had stated earlier on Thursday that there was “a full-blown investigation occurring . . . with the intelligence neighborhood and the justice division”.

A Pentagon spokesperson, Brigadier Normal Pat Ryder, on Thursday described the leak as “a deliberate felony act.”

US officers stated they have been beginning to assess the fallout from the leak whilst they attempt to perceive its full extent.

The Pentagon can also be conducting its personal evaluate on who has entry to delicate info and the way it’s distributed. The defence division has already begun clamping down on who receives day by day intelligence briefings and in addition to its most delicate info, US officers stated Thursday.

Biden tried to minimize the results of the leak. Whereas the paperwork don’t include battle plans for Ukraine’s coming counteroffensive in opposition to Russia, they provide a extra downbeat image of the state of Ukrainian forces and their potential to make important positive factors on the battlefield within the coming months.

“I’m involved that it occurred, however there’s nothing contemporaneous that I’m conscious of that’s of nice consequence proper now,” the president stated.