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| Italy Abu Omar rendition: Col Romano pardoned in CIA case | |
| 2013-04-06 | |
| Italian President Giorgio Napolitano has pardoned a US Air Force colonel convicted in absentia over the rendition of an Egyptian imam in 2003. Joseph Romano was one of 23 Americans tried and sentenced by Italian courts over the CIA-led operation to abduct a cleric known as Abu Omar. The Egyptian said he was flown to his home country and tortured there. Mr Napolitano's office cited what it said were changes to US security policy undertaken by President Barack Obama. It said Mr Obama had "immediately after his election, put an end to an approach to the challenges to national security... considered by Italy and the European Union not compatible with fundamental principles of rule of law". It added that the Italian president "hoped to provide a solution to an affair considered by the United States to be without precedent because of the conviction of a US military officer of Nato for deeds committed on Italian soil". The statement said the decision to pardon Col Romano was inspired by the same principle that Italy hoped to see used in the case of two Italian marines facing murder charges in India over the shooting of two fishermen.
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| Posted by:tipper |
| #1 The statement said the decision to pardon Col Romano was inspired by the same principle that Italy hoped to see used in the case of two Italian marines facing murder charges in India over the shooting of two fishermen. That's filed under - Damn we set a precedent, how do we get out of it now that it comes back and bites our posterior? |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2013-04-06 09:27 |