Gulag’ leak from CIA men
EASTERN European countries were yesterday scrambling to distance themselves from the CIA as officials in Washington searched for the source of an embarrassing leak that exposed a programme of secret jails for terrorist detainees. Claims that the CIA has been hiding prominent Al-Qaeda members at a so-called “black site” facility in eastern Europe have prompted angry denials from Romania, Poland and Albania. As details emerged yesterday of CIA flights to remote military airfields in northeast Poland and southeast Romania, George W Bush’s administration ordered an internal inquiry into how classified data was leaked to The Washington Post and Human Rights Watch, a New York-based group. Senior intelligence sources blamed the leak on CIA officers unhappy at having to maintain what one former counter-terrorism official described as “secret gulags”. The prisons are believed to hold at least 30 Al-Qaeda leaders labelled “ghost detainees” by Human Rights Watch. Many no longer have any intelligence value, but the CIA has been ordered to shield them from international scrutiny or legal proceedings.
The publication of flight logs detailing CIA movements has focused attention on a former military base at Szczytno-Szymany in Poland. Polish officials acknowledged that a Boeing 737 carrying seven Americans landed at the base in September 2003 and took five others on board. The plane continued to the Mihail Kogalniceanu air base in Romania, then to the US base in Guantanamo, Cuba.
Poland and Romania said the plane’s stops had nothing to do with prisoner transfers. Other sources said Albania or Macedonia might have co-operated with the CIA.
NOTE EU-DIGEST: EU member nations participating in such practises not worthy of EU membership
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