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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings & Torture |
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July 1st,
2009 - ‘CIA Snatch’ Wife to Ask Strasbourg |
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‘CIA Snatch’ Wife to Ask
Strasbourg Muslim cleric’s wife to appeal to human rights court From Ansa July 1, 2009 Milan - The wife of a Muslim
cleric allegedly snatched by the CIA from Italy to Egypt in 2003 is to appeal
to the European Court of Human Rights against state secrecy rules which have
muzzled prosecutors here. Nabila Ghali, the second wife
of Hassan Mustafa Omar Nasr, will appeal against norms which have clamped a
lid on the Milan trial, attorney Luca Bauccio said Wednesday. Speaking after the trial
judge rejected a reiterated appeal against the secrecy norms, Bauccio said he
was ''certain'' that the Strasbourg-based court would condemn Italy ''for
this de facto immunity that the Italian premier's office has given to persons
who have probably (committed) atrocious crimes''. The European Court of Human
Rights handles cases for the 47 members of the Council of Europe, Europe's
human rights body. Bauccio said Ghali, who has
given graphic testimony of her husband's alleged torture, would ask the
Strasbourg court to decide whether the secrecy norms violate international
law. ''In Italy, one can no
longer be certain that due process applies to the most serious crimes,'' the
lawyer said. Ghali, who is an Italian
citizen, is standing as civil plaintiff in the criminal case against several
former top Italian spies and 26 CIA agents. Nasr, who is also known as
Abu Omar, is not attending the trial because he has been unable to leave
Egypt. The trial, which began two years ago, was highly anticipated as the
first judicial examination of the controversial practice of extraordinary
rendition. The CIA has refused to
comment on the trial and its officers, who are being tried in absentia, were
silent until Tuesday when ex-Rome station chief Robert Seldon Lady told the
Il Giornale daily that he was only following orders. Lady, who has now retired,
said from an undisclosed location that he was ''a soldier...in a war against
terrorism''. Il Giornale is owned by the
brother of Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi, who along with his predecessor
Romano Prodi obtained a Constitutional Court ruling in March that has forced
prosecutors to do without swathes of evidence. The ruling, delivered on March
12, also exempted Berlusconi and Prodi from testifying on the alleged
abduction. It said questions that might
break state secrecy were not permissible. The prosecution had argued
that state secrecy norms were not violated and the alleged abduction was a
''subversive'' act that breached the Constitution. Italian governments have
denied any role in Nasr's disappearance and argued that the prosecutors'
probe compromised relations with foreign security agencies. The top Italian defendant is
Niccolo' Pollari, the former head of military intelligence agency SISMI,
which recently changed its name to AISE. Eight Italians including
Pollari and his former deputy Marco Mancini are on trial with the 26 CIA
agents. As well as Lady, the US
agents include ex-Milan station chief Jeff Castelli. Worldwide Headlines The trial of Nasr has
claimed headlines worldwide and stoked discussion of rendition, which was
recently extended by President Barack Obama under the proviso that detainees'
rights should be respected. The Council of Europe has
called Nasr's case a ''perfect example of rendition''. The imam, the former head of
Milan's main mosque, disappeared from the northern Italian city on February
17, 2003. Prosecutors say he was
snatched by a team of CIA operatives with SISMI's help and taken to a NATO
base in Ramstein, Germany. From there, they say he was
taken to Egypt to be interrogated. Nasr, who was under
investigation in Italy on suspicion of helping terrorists, was released early
in 2007 from an Egyptian jail where he says he was beaten, given electric
shocks and threatened with rape. He has demanded millions of
euros in compensation from the Italian government. Berlusconi was in power at
the time of the abduction. Prodi succeeded him in 2006
but was defeated by him two years later. The CIA was first granted
permission to use rendition in a presidential directive signed by President
Bill Clinton in 1995 and the practice grew sharply after the September 11
terrorist attacks. External link: http://www.ansa.it/site/notizie/awnplus/english/news/2009-07-01_101317949.html |