In what might prove to be more convincing evidence of extra-terrestrial life than those alien selfies the other week, the CIA has chosen to release thousands of declassified documents on UFOs and the like.

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They even cracked an X-Files joke in the process:

We’ve decided to highlight a few documents both skeptics and believers will find interesting. Below you will find five documents we think X-Files character Agent Fox Mulder would love to use to try and persuade others of the existence of extraterrestrial activity.

Ha, good one. All the documents date from the late 1940s and 50s and suggest UFO sightings in Britain, Germany, Spain and North Africa:

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What’s weird is that this all coincides with the release of the new series of The X-Files. Did the CIA think more people would be interested because of this, or is it perhaps the X-Files that stands to benefit the most? Strange timing, that’s for sure.

For the record, the CIA says that it released the documents “to prove there is a scientific explanation for UFO sightings” and say that in most cases “the subject UFO is not of direct intelligence interest”.

I guess they’re keeping the really juicy stuff for themselves.

If you’re interested, here’s a cool animated map showing all reported UFO sightings since 1933.