Dec 28, 2:36 PM EST
Italians seeking to question CIA agent
By AIDAN LEWIS Associated Press Writer
ROME (AP) -- Italian prosecutors are seeking to question the former CIA station chief in Milan about a trip he took to Egypt days after the CIA allegedly kidnapped a Muslim cleric from Milan and flew him to Cairo, a court official said Wednesday.
Prosecutors want to ask Robert Seldon Lady about his 2003 trip and whether he knows anything about the interrogation and torture the cleric says he suffered in Egypt, the Milan official said.
The request to question Lady and 21 other purported CIA operatives was in a document prosecutors forwarded to the Italian Justice Ministry on Friday, the official said. The official asked not to be named because he did not want to speak publicly about the request before the Justice Ministry decides on it.
Justice Minister Roberto Castelli and Premier Silvio Berlusconi have suggested they may be unwilling to push the case.
Lady returned to the United States after leaving his post in Milan in 2004. The whereabouts and true identities of the others are unknown. U.S. officials have refused to comment on the case.
The purported operatives are wanted for the alleged abduction of Egyptian cleric and terrorist suspect Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, also known as Abu Omar, from a Milan street on Feb. 17, 2003. Prosecutors say he was taken by the CIA to a joint U.S.-Italian air base, flown to Germany and then Egypt.
The operation was believed part of the CIA's "extraordinary rendition" program in which terrorism suspects are transferred to third countries where some allegedly are subjected to torture.
Milan prosecutors have sought to extradite the 22 suspects from the United States, although the Justice Ministry has not yet decided whether to forward the requests to Washington.
In the arrest warrant, the judge said cell phone records showed that Lady was in Egypt from Feb. 22 to March 15, 2003. Those were likely the first days Nasr was being tortured during interrogations, she said.
Prosecutors' request to question Lady about the trip was first reported Wednesday by the Chicago Tribune.
Nasr claimed in intercepted phone calls with his wife that he was hung upside down and subjected to extreme temperatures and loud noise that damaged his hearing, officials said.
Lady's lawyer, Daria Pesce, said her client traveled to Egypt shortly after Nasr's alleged abduction, but she said it was an official visit for the Milan consulate that had nothing to do with Nasr.
Pesce maintains Lady was not involved in any kidnapping, and that he should be protected from prosecution by diplomatic immunity.