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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings, Torture and Big Money |
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February 18th,
2007 - Pilots Traced to CIA Renditions |
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Pilots Traced to CIA Renditions The Times identifies three fliers facing kidnapping charges in Germany
related to a 2003 counter-terrorism mission. By Bob Drogin and John Goetz Los Angeles Times February 18, 2007 Clayton, N.C. - The forecast
called for heavy snow on the route home, so the three pilots who had just
flown a covert CIA-sponsored "extraordinary rendition" flight were
forced to stay an extra night at the Gran Melia Victoria, a luxury hotel
overlooking the marina on the island of Majorca. Up in Room 552, the pilot
who called himself Capt. James Fairing picked up the phone at 2:28 in the
afternoon and dialed his tree-shaded home in a subdivision carved out of pine
forests here in Clayton, about 15 miles southeast of Raleigh. He also called
his employer, a North Carolina-based air charter service that long has worked
for the CIA. Fairing's copilot, who
registered as Eric Matthew Fain, reached for the phone in his room and called
a woman back home with whom he owns a 22-foot speedboat and who also flies
missions for the CIA. The third pilot from the stranded flight carried a U.S.
passport issued to Kirk James Bird. The passport photo shows a balding,
middle-age man with a broad smile. The names they used were all
aliases, but The Times confirmed their real identities from government
databases and visited their homes this month after a German court in January
ordered the arrest of the three "ghost pilots" and 10 other alleged
members of the CIA's special renditions unit on charges of kidnapping and
causing serious bodily harm to Khaled Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese
descent, three years ago. Charged under aliases None of the pilots responded
to repeated requests for comment left with family members and on their home
telephones. The Times is not publishing their real names because they have
been charged only under their aliases. Relying on the operatives'
passport numbers, hotel records, credit card bills and aviation records,
German prosecutors are seeking to properly identify the 13 Americans in a
high-profile case that has upset relations between Washington and Berlin and
caused a political scandal in Germany over whether government officials
sanctioned the CIA operation. Elsewhere in Europe, legal
and parliamentary investigations have focused a harsh spotlight on the CIA's
program to abduct suspected terrorists and ferry them to secret sites for
interrogation, operations known variously as "black renditions" or
"extraordinary renditions." On Friday, an Italian judge
issued arrest warrants for 26 suspected CIA operatives for allegedly
abducting a radical Muslim cleric outside his mosque in Milan in February
2003 and delivering him to Egypt, where his lawyer says he was tortured. The
trial is set for June 8 in Milan. All the Americans charged,
including the top two CIA officers in Italy at the time, have departed the
country, but Italian law allows defendants to be tried in absentia. None of the aliases used in
Italy match those in the German case, although one of the pilots may have
been involved in both incidents. One former CIA operation
officer who was involved in the Italian case at CIA headquarters, speaking on
condition of anonymity because the case is classified, said he and his
colleagues were increasingly nervous about traveling in Europe for fear of
getting swept up in the investigations. He said he checked with a contact at
the Italian intelligence service for reassurance that he would not be
arrested. Seized in error According to Masri's
account, he was detained by local authorities while crossing from Serbia into
Macedonia on Dec. 31, 2003. Three weeks later, seven or eight men in masks
stripped him naked, put him in a diaper and jumpsuit, drugged him and then
chained him, spread-eagle and blindfolded, to the floor of a Boeing 737 that
flew to Afghanistan on Jan. 24, 2004. German prosecutors say the men in masks
were with the CIA rendition team. At the time, U.S.
intelligence authorities believed Masri was involved with radical Islamic
groups in Ulm, a city in southern Germany. Masri was released five months
later after undergoing what he described as repeated beatings and other
physical abuse in a now-closed CIA-run prison called the Salt Pit in Kabul,
the Afghan capital. U.S. officials have told German authorities that Masri
was seized and imprisoned in error because his name is similar to that of a
suspected terrorist linked to Al Qaeda. Flight records show that
Aero Contractors, based in Smithfield, N.C., operated the plane that carried
Masri from Macedonia to Afghanistan. The charter aircraft company has flown
scores of sensitive missions for the CIA and has played a key support role in
counter-terrorism operations since the Sept. 11 attacks, according to former
agency officials. The three pilots in the
Masri rendition case live within a 30-minute drive of the guarded Aero hangar
and offices at the rural Johnston County airport. Reached by telephone
Saturday, Aero official Freddy Pearce declined to discuss any aspect of the
company's business. The chief pilot in the Masri
case, who used the alias Fairing, called Pearce at his Clayton home during
his layover in Spain. In real life, the chief
pilot is 52, drives a Toyota Previa minivan and keeps a collection of model
trains in a glass display case near a large bubbling aquarium in his living
room. Federal aviation records show he is rated to fly seven kinds of
aircraft as long as he wears his glasses. His wife, reached by phone
at her office, said her husband had done no wrong. "He's just a
pilot," she said. His copilot, who used the
alias Fain, is a bearded man of 35 who lives with his father and two dogs in
a separate subdivision. He called home during a subsequent mission from the
Royal Plaza Hotel on the Spanish resort island of Ibiza, according to records
collected by Spanish investigators from the Guardia Civil. The third pilot, who used
the alias Bird, is 46, drives a Ford Explorer and has a 17-foot aluminum
fishing boat. Certified as a flight instructor, he keeps plastic models of
his favorite planes mounted by the fireplace in his living room in a house
that backs onto a private golf course here. His wife declined to comment. On the flight back to
Washington, after the snow had cleared, the rendition team celebrated by
ordering 17 shrimp cocktails and three bottles of fine Spanish wine,
according to catering invoices obtained by the prosecutors. External link: http://tinyurl.com/2ep7ow |