[News] Italy: CIA Agents indicted for Imam Abduction

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ITALY: CIA AGENTS INDICTED FOR IMAM ABDUCTION
http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.php?cat=Security&loid=8.0.180525624&par=0#

Milan, 24 June (AKI) - An Italian judge has ordered the arrest of 13 CIA 
agents for the abduction of an Egyptian cleric in the northern city of 
Milan and his transfer to Cairo, where he was then tortured until he 
partially lost the use of his legs. Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, also known 
as Abu Omar, was seized near his home in Milan on 17 February 2003. His 
capture is part of a controversial practice "extraordinary rendition" 
stepped up after the September 11 2001 attacks. Terror suspects are picked 
up irrespective of national laws and sent to third countries in what rights 
groups denounce as 'outsourcing torture'.
Milan daily Corriere della Sera reports that among those issued with arrest 
warrants on Thursday was the former US diplomatic consul in Milan, Robert 
Seldon Lady, who was replaced unexpectedly several months ago. Warrants 
were issued for ten men and three women, whose nationalities were not 
specified.

Abu Omar, had already been under surveillance by Italian police, because of 
suspected links with terrorist groups. Foreign intelligence sources say he 
had fought in Afghanistan and Bosnia, before his arrival in Italy in 1997.

Two years ago, he left the house, telling his wife he was going to the 
mosque nearby. But he never arrived, after being cornered in a side street 
and bundled into a van.

Nothing more was heard of him until April 20, 2004, when he called his wife 
- whose phone line was still tapped - to tell her he was still alive. Some 
days later, he called his friend, the Egyptian imam in Milan, Mohammed 
Ridha, and told him all that had happened since he disappeared.

He told Ridha he had been driven to an American airbase, questioned and 
beaten, and the following day flown to Egypt where was handed over to the 
interior ministry. If he agreed to return to Italy and work as a secret 
agent, his interrogators told him, he would not be harmed.

Rejecting this offer he was sent to Tora high security prison camp in Egypt 
where he remained for more than a year. Omar told his friend he had been so 
badly beaten that he could hardly move his legs and had been tortured with 
electric cables.

On April 19, 2004, Omar was unexpectedly released, on the condition that he 
told no-one what had happened. However after the phone calls to his wife 
and Ridha, which were reported in the Italian newspapers, he was arrested 
and nothing more has been heard of him.

Fundamental in the investigation was the use by the CIA operatives of 
Italian cellphones. A total of 17 mobile phones were identified operating 
in the street where Omar was seized between 12.28 and 12.33 of 17 February 
2003. Some of these were found to have placed calls to the US consulate in 
Milan and to a number in Virginia (where the CIA headquarters are based, at 
Langley). One mobile phone was traced as being located in Cairo the next 
day, the others led investigators to the luxury hotel where the group 
stayed and, consequently, to the identities - or false identities - of the 
agents.

Serving the arrest warrants may prove near impossible and the prospect of 
extraditing CIA agents to Italy seems even more remote.

The episode will however put the spotlight again on the controversial 
'extraordinary rendition' practice. Human rights groups have strongly 
criticised the sending of terror suspects to third countries where they are 
tortured.

In Italy opposition politicians are demanding explanations from the 
government of prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, a close ally of President 
Bush as to whether Italian authorities were aware of what was going on.






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