The preservation order comes amid fears by two private groups that the White House has failed to take the necessary steps to deal with millions e-mails that apparently are missing.

The issue first surfaced three years ago during the investigation into the leak of a CIA operative's identity.

Wednesday's order by U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy directs the Executive Office of the President to issue a notice to employees to surrender any e-mails from March 2003 to October 2005.

That period includes the start of the war in Iraq and the first two years of the probe into the leak by top White House aides of the identity of Valerie Plame, wife of Bush administration war critic Joe Wilson.

The White House said it has made great progress in accounting for e-mail messages. A spokesman declined further comment.

The administration is in the process of transferring over 300 million e-mail messages to the National Archives, said White House spokesman Scott Stanzel, in addition to over 25,000 boxes of records.

A lawyer for one of the groups in the suit criticized the White House for refusing to provide details of what it is doing to recover any missing e-mail.

``Instead of coming clean and telling the public what they have been doing to solve the crisis, they refused to say anything,'' said Sheila Shadmand, who is representing the National Security Archive.

The judge's action extends a preservation order in the case from November 2007 that covers computer disaster recovery backup tapes. That would be one possible source for restoring missing e-mails.

(AP)