Saturday, August 13 2005 13:43 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New York: US authorities today (Aug 13, 2005) released thousands of new witness accounts of the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York following a long legal battle led by families of the victims and The New York Times.

More than 12,000 pages were released by the New York Fire Department, including accounts from 503 firefighters, doctors and emergency personnel, as well as the list of emergency calls made to authorities.

The documents were compiled by firefighters from October 2001 but were never really examined or used.

"The department believes that the materials being released today including oral histories and radio communications will serve to further confirm the bravery and courage of our members who responded to the World Trade Center," said the fire department in a statement.

"It is the Departments hope that the release of these records will not cause our members and their families any additional pain or anguish."

Monica Gabrielle, a co-chair of the Skyscraper Safety Campaign, whose businessman husband died on September 11, said: "It is a large step forward in our search for answers to some of the unknowns. Today, we are one step closer to learning what happened on 9/11 in NYC, where we excelled, where we failed."

"The release of the information contained in these 23 CDs is not meant to be used to sensationalize the deaths of almost 3,000 innocent souls. It is meant for serious public scrutiny in order to at the very least mitigate casualties next time," she added.

The New York Times sought the documents in February 2002 under the Freedom of Information Act, but the city refused and the newspaper took the battle to court.

In early 2005, an appeals court ordered the city to make nearly all of the material public. "We're gratified that it's finally being done," David McCraw, a lawyer for the Times, said in an interview with the newspaper published today.

"We believe it should have been done a long time ago. We believe the public is ultimately the beneficiary," he said, adding: "We hope the city will move quickly to release the 9/11 tapes.