Italy convicts 23 US agents in CIA kidnap trial

Published: November 05, 2009

The rights group Human Rights Watch hailed the verdict, even though the two highest-ranking officials were not convicted.
“No one was found innocent,” noted Joanne Mariner, while lamenting those who “got off the hook because of the Constitutional Court’s overbroad interpretation of state secrecy.”
“The Italian government was found responsible for collaborating with the CIA. It was a brave ruling for an Italian court,” Mariner told AFP.
“And we agree with the prosecutors that diplomatic immunity is not meant to cover people involved in grave human rights abuses,” said Mariner, Director of HRW’s Terrorism and Anti-Terrorism Programme.
The trial was delayed as successive Italian governments sought to have it thrown out as a threat to national security. Defendants argued that state secrecy rules prevented them from being able to prove their innocence.
The issue went before Italy’s Constitutional Court, which agreed that part of the investigation had violated state secrecy provisions but said the prosecution could use evidence obtained correctly.
Spataro earlier Wednesday rejected the court ruling, saying: “There is no legal structure under which SISMI and the CIA could agree to carry out a kidnapping. It is absolutely against Italian law.”
The prosecutor lamented what he called the “twisted logic” behind an operation that broke the law as well as sending a suspect to endure torture.
“This only encourages the multiplication of terrorists,” said Spataro, who became known for his work against the left-wing militant group the Red Brigades that was active in the 1970s.

This news was published in print paper. To access the complete paper of this day. click here