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You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / CIA CYA

CIA CYA

by John Cole|  June 24, 20059:44 am| 15 Comments

This post is in: Foreign Affairs

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Looks like our policy of extraordinary rendition is continuing to make friends and influence people overseas:

An Italian judge has ordered the arrest of 13 CIA agents for allegedly helping deport an imam to Egypt as part of U.S. anti-terrorism efforts, an Italian official familiar with the investigation said Friday.

The agents are suspected in the seizure of an Egyptian-born imam identified as Abu Omar on the streets of Milan in February 2003, according to the official, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information.

The U.S. Embassy in Rome declined to comment.

Prosecutors believe the agents seized Omar as part of the CIA’s ”extraordinary rendition” program, in which terror suspects are transferred to third countries without court approval, according to reports Friday in newspapers Corriere della Sera and Il Giorno.

Investigators traced the agents through check-in details at Milan hotels and their use of Italian cell phones during the operation, the reports said. All the agents are American and include three women, Il Giorno said.

The reports said another six agents were being investigated for helping prepare the operation…

Italian papers have reported that Omar, 42, called his wife and friends in Milan after his release last year, recounting he had been seized by Italian and American agents and taken to a secret prison in Egypt, where he was tortured with electric shocks.

Fabulous.

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Reader Interactions

15Comments

  1. 1.

    Aaron

    June 24, 2005 at 10:39 am

    Now I hope no one here was saying the CIA should be doing more after 9/11 (or before.)

    Because here they are doing something, and then they will get hit for it.

    And you wonder why there is no risk taking culture in the CIA pre 9/11.

  2. 2.

    BumperStickerist

    June 24, 2005 at 10:41 am

    St. John the Credulous,

    By my count there were a dozen weasel words in the press account. But, no doubt the serious of the allegations, et cetera, et cetera, and, obviously, we suck.

    Thanks for playing the Subitae role and weeping on our behalf. We’ll try to do better.

    For the children.

    Cheers

  3. 3.

    Stormy 70

    June 24, 2005 at 10:44 am

    The Italian courts can piss off for all I care. I want the CIA taking care of business, period. Italy are trying to treat these terrorists as criminals, while the terrorists are engaged in war. Gotta part ways with you here.

  4. 4.

    John Cole

    June 24, 2005 at 10:50 am

    You are right, Bumper. I will no longer rely on press reports, and instead will wait for the historical record of objective truth.

    I will start immediately, and begin discussing the day’s events from June 24th, 1977. I bet everyone will love that.

  5. 5.

    Stormy 70

    June 24, 2005 at 11:01 am

    “Italy are trying” – sorry for the grammar issues, I’ll try to do better.

  6. 6.

    p.lukasiak

    June 24, 2005 at 11:17 am

    what concerns me is that, according to the article, the kidnapping interfered with an on-going investigation in Italy.

    So lets say that you are the Italian government, and you are trying to prevent terrorist attacks by rounding up everyone in a terrorist network, and you are gaining valuable information by keeping very close tabs on this guy Omar. And the USA comes in and kidnaps the guy — and everyone he was associated with immediately goes underground because Omar knows who they are and where to find them…..

    But, of course, the Italians have no right to prevent terrorist attacks in their own country. The only nation that has a right to prevent terrorist attacks is the USA…

    is that about how you see it, Stormy?

  7. 7.

    Stormy 70

    June 24, 2005 at 11:48 am

    I will prefer the US not sit on its ass waiting for the Italians, Italians of all people, to run their investigation, if by interfering it protects America’s vital interests. Sorry, I don’t trust anyone in Italy to protect me.

  8. 8.

    J. Michael Neal

    June 24, 2005 at 1:53 pm

    In other words, Stormy doesn’t think that we should respect the sovereignty of our allies. We should be allowed to kidnap anyone we want to, anywhere in the world.

    Tell me, Stormy, does this mean that the British should have the right to kidnap Americans that have supported the IRA and whisk them back to somplace they will be tortured? Do the Fidelistas have the right to kidnap Cuban exiles that have been involved in terrorist actions against Castro and take them back to Cuba?

    Or is the US the only country that ought to have sovereignty?

  9. 9.

    Losing Faith

    June 24, 2005 at 1:59 pm

    Stormy70 (Sealab reference?)
    The point is we don’t exactly have a right to just run into their country and take people, even if they’re part of an investigation we’re doing. If we wanted him, we should have tried to go through proper channels in Italy regardless of who we trust there. I’m sure plenty of people in the world don’t trust the US, but I’m positive everyone would be pissed if another government’s agents came in and started grabbing people from the US.

  10. 10.

    p.lukasiak

    June 24, 2005 at 2:48 pm

    Sorry, I don’t trust anyone in Italy to protect me.

    here’s a clue. The italians are far more interested in protecting their own people than they are in protecting you. And if they are running an investigation on their own soil designed to protect their people that involves following around someone suspected of planning a terrorist attack in order to make sure that everyone involved in the attack is captured, they have the RIGHT to do that. And if that makes you feel less safe, then move to Italy.

  11. 11.

    aw

    June 24, 2005 at 3:29 pm

    Stormy, Porter Goss says we can’t go after OBL, even though he has a good idea where he is(Pakistan), because of sovereignty issues. How do you reconcile that with this issue of violating Italian sovereignty?

  12. 12.

    aw

    June 24, 2005 at 3:33 pm

    Stormy, Porter Goss says we can’t go after OBL, even though he has a good idea where he is(Pakistan), because of sovereignty issues. How do you reconcile that with this issue of violating Italian sovereignty?

  13. 13.

    Stormy 70

    June 24, 2005 at 4:17 pm

    Do you guys really believe we are not doing anything in Pakistan? And you would call for the CIA chief to be fired if he said, “Yes, we do have super-secret black ops occurring in country X.” All countries have sneaky spy types running around in all the other countries. It is how the world works. If Italy is going to arrest our CIA types, then our country will make them feel the heat somewhere else. It is usually done through back channels, and not done openly, like this Italian judge is doing. Of course, Italy wrote the book on corruption, so I am going to wait and see how this shakes out in the future.

  14. 14.

    aw

    June 25, 2005 at 10:51 am

    I’m sure we have CIA types all over Pakistan. What he is saying is that we’re not going to do anything about OBL because he’s in Pakistan and we’re not going to violate Pakistan’s sovereignty.

  15. 15.

    Losing Faith

    June 27, 2005 at 12:55 pm

    The whole soveriegnty excuse for why we’re not going after OBL is BS. Why did we go after him when the Taliban was in power? They had sovereignty. We didn’t like it, but they did. We obviously don’t want to catch him. Or rather Bush obviously doesn’t want to catch him.

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