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Glenn Greenwald (right): "They spent the entire day asking about the reporting I was doing and other Guardian journalists were doing on the NSA stories"
The police will be asked to justify the detention of a journalist's partner under terror laws, the chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee has said.
Keith Vaz said the full facts of David Miranda's nine-hour detention at Heathrow must be established quickly.
Mr Miranda's partner is a journalist who published documents leaked by US whistleblower Edward Snowden.
Police have not said why Mr Miranda was held, but he said he was kept in a room and quizzed by "six agents".
Brazil has complained that his detention was "without justification".
The Home Office said it was for the police to decide when to use its powers to stop people.
'Seeking clarification'Mr Miranda, 28, was held at Heathrow on Sunday, on his way from Berlin to Rio de Janeiro, where he lives with his partner, Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald.
"I remained in a room, there were six different agents coming and going, talking to me," Mr Miranda said.
"They asked questions about my entire life, about everything.
"They took my computer, video game, mobile phone, my memory cards, everything."
In Germany, Mr Miranda had been staying with US film-maker Laura Poitras, who has also been working on the Snowden files with Mr Greenwald and the Guardian. according to the newspaper.
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It is believed his flights were being paid for by the Guardian. A spokesperson said he was not an employee of the newspaper but "often assists" Mr Greenwald with his work.
Mr Miranda was held under schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000. This allows police to hold someone at an airport for up to nine hours for questioning about whether they have been involved with acts of terrorism.
Anyone detained must "give the examining officer any information in his possession which the officer requests". Any property seized must be returned after seven days.
The Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, David Anderson QC, said it was very unusual for a passenger to be held for the full nine hours under this schedule and he wanted to "get to the bottom" of what had happened.
He said he has asked the Home Office and Scotland Yard for a full briefing.
The Guardian said it was "dismayed" that Mr Miranda had been detained and was "urgently seeking clarification from the British authorities" as to why it had happened.
The Metropolitan Police confirmed a 28-year-old man was held from 08:05 BST until 17:00 BST on Sunday under schedule 7 and was not arrested.
According to the Home Office, more than 97% of examinations under schedule 7 last less than an hour.
Mr Greenwald said the British authorities' actions in holding Mr Miranda amounted to "intimidation and bullying" and linked it to his writing about Edward Snowden's revelations concerning the US National Security Agency (NSA).
"They never asked him about a single question at all about terrorism or anything relating to a terrorist organisation," he told the BBC.
"They spent the entire day asking about the reporting I was doing and other Guardian journalists were doing on the NSA stories.
"The principal point, since they kept him for the full nine hours, is to try and send a message of intimidation and bullying."
He added: "I don't understand why they don't realise that all it's going to accomplish is the exact opposite effect - I'm going to report more aggressively and with a more emboldened mind."
Writing to policeMr Snowden, who has been granted temporary asylum in Russia, leaked details of extensive internet and phone surveillance by American intelligence services.
According to the Guardian, Mr Snowden passed "thousands of files" to Mr Greenwald, who has written a series of stories about surveillance by US and UK authorities.
The NSA has broken privacy rules and overstepped its legal authority thousands of times in the past two years, according to the leaked documents.
Mr Vaz told the BBC police must "of course" question people if they have "concerns" about what they are doing in the UK.
"What is extraordinary is they knew he was the partner [of Mr Greenwald] and therefore it is clear not only people who are directly involved are being sought but also the partners of those involved," he said.
"Bearing in mind it is a new use of terrorism legislation to detain someone in these circumstances... I will write to the police to ask for the justification of the use of terrorism legislation - they may have a perfectly reasonable explanation."
He later said: "Those of us who were part of passing this legislation certainly would not have expected it to be used in a case of this kind."
The Brazilian government issued an official statement soon after the release of Mr Miranda.
The foreign ministry document said there was no justification for detaining an "individual against whom there are no charges that can legitimate the use of that [anti-terror] legislation".
It also said Brazil expects incidents "such as the one that happened to the Brazilian citizen today" not to be repeated.
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