Swiss Senator Dick Marty, author of a Council of Europe report on CIA jails, says dissident United States intelligence officers angry with former defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld helped a European probe uncover details of secret CIA prisons in Europe.
| Swiss Senator Marty said senior CIA officials disapproved of Rumsfeld's methods in hunting down terrorist suspects, and had agreed to talk to him |
The senator said senior CIA officials disapproved of Rumsfeld's methods in hunting down terrorist suspects, and had agreed to talk to him on condition of anonymity. "There were huge conflicts between the CIA and Rumsfeld. Many leading figures in the CIA did not accept these methods at all," Marty told European Parliament committees, defending his work against complaints it was based on unnamed sources.
The report issued last month said the Central Intelligence Agency ran secret jails in Poland and Romania, with the complicity of those governments, and transported terrorist suspects across Europe in secret flights. Poland and Romania have repeatedly denied hosting CIA prisons on their soil.
"People in the CIA felt these things were not consonant with the sort of intelligence work they normally do," said Marty.
| Yes, we noticed. Pity we needed a parallel structure to accomplish anything. |
| Natural result of the transformation of the CIA: they used to hire the best and brightest from Ivy League schools, who were establishment and conservative. Now they hire the best and brightest from Ivy League schools, who are leftist-establishment and progressive. The result was not in doubt. |
He said he had based his findings largely on conversations with "high officials of the CIA (and) highly placed European office-holders, who for different reasons, often honourable reasons, were ready to explain what had happened".
| And none of whom can be named, of course. |
"The Americans themselves admitted there were secret prisons, that they abducted people from the streets, that people were handed over to countries like Syria, Yemen, Egypt where they were tortured," he said.
US President George W Bush acknowledged last year that the CIA had held top al-Qaeda suspects in secret overseas detention centres but did not say in which countries. "The president of United States made a very important statement. I think we can all expect... in the near future further admissions," said Marty.
| Banking on a Democrat in the White House soon, are you? |
| Or yet another Congressional hearing. |
He also said he would not remove the names of former Polish and Romanian government officials from the report, although they threatened on Tuesday to take legal action against the senator.
The report said former Polish national security adviser Marek Siwiec and former Romanian Defence Minister Ioan Pascu knew their countries had hosted secret CIA detention centres. "I have no reason to withdraw his name. I would certainly not be prepared to apologise. He knew exactly what was happening as did his president," Marty told a news conference, referring to Siwiec and former Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski. "I am not shaking in my shoes," he said of the libel suit that Siwiec vowed to launch in a Polish court unless Marty removed his name from the report within seven days.
Pascu challenged Marty in the hearing to substantiate his allegations or withdraw them, but the Swiss legislator did not respond directly.
| Of course not. Doesn't need to in order to damage their work. |
| Done in the best Seymour Hersh tradition. |
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