Abu Omar's CIA trial in Italy adjourned to October 24

MILAN: A court in Milan on Monday adjourned until October 24 the trial of 25 CIA agents and a US air force colonel accused of kidnapping an Egyptian terrorism suspect, judicial officials said. In the case dubbed CIA-gate in the Italian press, Osama Mustafa Hassan, an imam in Milan better known as Abu Omar, was abducted and transferred to a high-security prison outside Cairo, where he claims he was tortured. The court decision came after a defence motion for a suspension pending a ruling by the Constitutional Court on whether Milan prosecutors had violated state secrecy laws by using wiretaps on Italian agents in their probe. Seven Italians have also been indicted for the trial, whose start on June 8 coincided with the release of an explosive report on secret detentions in Europe by the US Central Intelligence Agency. Abu Omar s seizure was thought to be among scores of secret abductions around the world since the attacks of September 11, 2001, in the US extraordinary rendition program, under which terror suspects have been transferred to countries known to practice torture. The 26 American defendants are being tried in absentia, while all but one of the seven Italian defendants did not appear at the trial s opening. Among the Italians is the former head of Italy s SISMI military intelligence, General Nicolo Pollari, who was forced to resign in November over the affair. Among the Americans are the former CIA Milan station chief Robert Seldon Lady, the Rome CIA station chief Jeffrey Castelli and US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Romano, who was stationed at the Aviano air base in northeastern Italy at the time. The Constitutional Court is expected to rule on the state secrecy question later this year. If it rules in favor of the government the case will probably be thrown out. Abu Omar was snatched from a Milan street in broad daylight on February 17, 2003, and taken via Aviano to Cairo. Released in February after four years in prison outside Cairo, he has told of torture and humiliation during his incarceration such as being forced to defecate on the floor of his cell. The Abu Omar case is among several issues that have clouded relations between Rome and Washington in recent years. The kidnapping took place while staunch US ally Silvio Berlusconi was prime minister, and he insists that he was never informed of the operation. The centre-left government of his successor Romano Prodi has said it would follow Berlusconi s policy of refusing to seek the extradition of the 26 Americans requested by the Milan prosecutors.