Unredacted materials relating to the assassination of 35th US President John F. Kennedy in 1963 were released on Tuesday at the direction of US President Donald Trump shortly after his inauguration.
Over 1,100 documents totaling more than 31,000 pages were posted on the website of the US National Archives and Records Administration in the evening.
Much of the National Archives' collection, containing more than a million pages of records, photographs, films, audio recordings and artifacts related to the killing, has been previously released.
Larry J. Sabato, director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics and author of “Kennedy's Half Century,” said he has a team that has begun analyzing the documents, but it will take time to fully understand their significance.
“We have a lot of work ahead of us for a long time, and people need to accept that,” he added.
Mr Trump announced the release on Monday during a visit to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, saying his administration would release about 80,000 pages.
“We have a huge amount of documents. You're going to have to do a lot of reading,” Mr. Trump said.
Researchers estimate that the number of files that remain fully or partially classified is between 3,000 and 3,500. Last month, the FBI reported finding about 2,400 new records related to the murder.
Jefferson Morley, vice president of the Mary Ferrell Foundation, which holds files related to the murder, said in a statement on social media platform X that the release was an “encouraging start.”
Full versions of about a third of the redacted documents held by the National Archives are now available, he said – more than 1,100 of the roughly 3,500 documents.
“The over-classification of relatively minor information has been removed and it appears that there were no redactions, although we have not reviewed all the documents,” Mr Morley said.
The National Archives said on its website that, in accordance with the president's order, the release would include “all previously classified records.”
However, Mr. Morley noted that the documents released Tuesday did not include the two-thirds of files promised or any of the newly discovered FBI files.
Interest in details surrounding Kennedy's assassination has continued for decades, giving rise to numerous conspiracy theories.
He was assassinated on November 22, 1963, while visiting Dallas, when his motorcade was finishing its parade route downtown and shots were fired from the Texas School Book Depository building.
Police captured 24-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald, who had been manning a sniper's position on the sixth floor. Two days later, nightclub owner Jack Ruby shot and killed Oswald as he was being transferred to prison.
A year later, the Warren Commission, created by President Lyndam B. Johnson to investigate, concluded that Oswald acted alone and there was no evidence of a conspiracy. However, that did not stop alternative theories from spreading over the years.
Sourse: breakingnews.ie
