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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings & Torture |
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December 3rd,
2008 - Italian Judge Suspends Trial of CIA Agents |
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Italian Judge Suspends
Trial of CIA Agents By Associated Press December 3, 2008 Milan, Italy - An Italian
judge has suspended a kidnapping trial linked to the CIA's extraordinary
rendition program after the government said testimony could be a threat to
Italy's national security. The Milan trial involves 26
Americans and five Italian intelligence agents charged in the 2003 kidnapping
of an Egyptian cleric. Most of the Americans are CIA agents. The judge on Wednesday
suspended the trial until March 18 in the expectation that Italy's
Constitutional Court would have resolved the national security issue by then.
A ruling from the high court is due March 10. Both Premier Silvio
Berlusconi and his predecessor Romano Prodi have warned testimony in the case
could compromise operations between Italian spy services and the CIA. Copyright © 2008 The
Associated Press. External link: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iFK6jJ12W23VZD-Hsw_RZIo67JnwD94R7LI00 Italian judge
suspends CIA kidnapping trial By Sara Rossi Reuters December 3, 2008 Milan - A Milan judge on
Wednesday suspended the high-profile trial of U.S. and Italian agents suspected
of a CIA kidnapping after Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi authorized
witnesses to invoke state secrecy. Judge Oscar Magi said
Berlusconi had made it extremely difficult to know what evidence should be
allowed in the trial of 26 Americans and seven Italians accused of kidnapping
a terrorism suspect in Milan in 2003. Magi suspended the trial
until March next year, when a higher court is expected to rule on the
government's request to dismiss the case entirely. The government says it
should be thrown out because prosecutors violated state secrecy rules. Prosecutor Armando Spataro,
in some of his strongest language yet, accused Berlusconi and former Prime
Minister Romano Prodi of obstruction. "I understand the
defence lawyers' aspirations to interpret state secrecy as a path to impunity
or to prevent the discovery of the truth ... it is the same (as) the current
and previous prime ministers, to use state secrecy to obstruct justice,"
Spataro said. The spies are accused of
seizing a terrorism suspect, Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, in broad daylight on
the streets of Milan and flying him to Egypt, where he says he was tortured
and held for years without charge. The Americans, almost all of
whom are believed to working for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, and
are being tried in absentia. Human rights groups have
accused the United States of breaking international law and "outsourcing
torture" by secretly transferring people to other countries in
operations known as extraordinary renditions. Washington denies the
torture charge but has defended renditions as a valid counter-terrorism tool
that has produced vital intelligence. Berlusconi, who denies the
Italian government knew anything about a kidnap plot, wrote in a letter to
the court last month that it was free to hear evidence on the abduction
itself. But testimony about ties to
foreign spy agencies like the CIA "would expose our secret services to a
concrete risk of ostracism," he wrote. Judge Magi had criticised
those instructions, saying it would be difficult for prosecutors to prove a
kidnapping if related evidence was classified. Writing by Phil Stewart;
Editing by Catherine Bosley. © Thomson Reuters 2008. All
rights reserved. External link: http://uk.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUKTRE4B24N320081203 |