ROME: The trial of CIA agents accused of kidnapping an Egyptian imam has been postponed until April 22 by a court in the northern city of Milan.
Armando Spataro, who heads the team of anti-terrorist prosecutors attached to the court, welcomed the decision. He had requested the delay pending a full ruling by Italy s Constitutional Court over the conduct of the probe.
We await with confidence the ruling of the Constitutional Court, he told AFP.
The trial is the first in Europe into the US Central Intelligence Agency s extraordinary rendition program involving the secret transfers of terrorism suspects to third countries known to practice torture.
Twenty-six American defendants – 25 CIA agents and a US Air Force colonel – are being tried in absentia along with seven Italians including the former head of Italian military intelligence, Nicolo Pollari, who was forced to resign over the 2003 kidnapping.
Both sides claimed victory last week when the Constitutional Court ruled that state secrets had been violated in the probe, but Spataro has said the ruling referred only to documents not crucial to the prosecution s case.
The Constitutional Court will rule on to what extent the documents concerned can be used to prosecute the case.
Osama Mustafa Hassan, an imam better known as Abu Omar, was snatched from a Milan street on Feb. 17, 2003, in an operation coordinated by the CIA and Italian military intelligence.
Abu Omar was transferred to a high-security prison outside Cairo, where he was held for four years. After his release in February 2007, he told of torture and humiliation during his incarceration.
His seizure was thought to be among scores of secret abductions around the world since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Spataro is known for his work against the left-wing militant group the Red Brigades that was active in the 1970s.
His team had been investigating Abu Omar at the time of the imam s abduction. -AFP
