SWITZERLAND: A European investigator says he has proof Poland and Romania hosted secret CIA prisons under a post-9/11 pact to hunt down and interrogate "high-value" terrorist suspects wanted by the US.
Swiss senator Dick Marty said Poland housed some of the CIA's most sensitive prisoners, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who says he masterminded the September 11th, 2001, attacks. "There is now enough evidence to state that secret detention facilities run by the CIA did exist in Europe from 2003-2005, in particular in Poland and Romania," Mr Marty says in a report for the Council of Europe human rights watchdog.
Mr Marty accused the former Polish president and the current and former presidents of Romania of having known and approved of the secret CIA operations on their soil. EU members Poland and Romania have repeatedly denied the existence of secret prisons on their territory.
In a preliminary report last year, Mr Marty said 20 mostly European countries colluded in a "global spider's web" of secret CIA jails and flight transfers of terrorist suspects stretching from Asia to Guantánamo Bay.
The European Commission called on Romania and Poland to hold urgent, independent investigations into the allegations.
Commission spokesman Friso Roscam Abbing said the European Union executive was "very concerned indeed" about the report, which was the culmination of a 19-month investigation.
According to the report, Poland's then-president Aleksander Kwasniewski, head of national security bureau Marek Siwiec, defence minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski and head of military intelligence Marek Dukaczewski were aware of and could be held accountable for the operation of CIA secret prisons in Poland.
"Marty's work is pure political fiction . . . It is a waste of time and a waste of money," Mr Szmajdzinski said.
Former Romanian president Ion Iliescu, current president Traian Basescu and former defence minister Ioan Mircea Pascu were among those who "knew about, authorised and stand accountable" for Romania's role in the CIA programme, Mr Marty said.
"The current report, as the previous one from 2006, brings no evidence to confirm these allegations, except for unnamed sources, whose credibility cannot be estimated," the Romanian foreign ministry said.