2006-04-07: German Parliament Investigates Spy Affair in Iraq War
From Xiandos Info
Germany's parliament voted yes to establishing a investigating committee to investigate the nature of the countries federal intelligence agency BND's assistance to U.S. combat operations during the 2003 Iraq invasion on Friday 7. April 2006.
The committee is made up by eight government and three opposition lawmakers. It is presided over by Volker Kauder, head of Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives.
The 11-member parliamentary panel will investigate whether German officials gave information about a German citizen of Lebanese origin, a Khaled el-Masri, to the CIA. He had done nothing except being named and was kidnapped by the CIA, interrogated in an Afghan prison and then released months later.
The BND have admitted that one of its agents worked with the U.S. military in it's operations command center during the invasion.
There has also been a series of reports that Germany's Federal Intelligence Service passed on important information on Saddam Hussein's plans for the defense of Baghdad to U.S. forces before the invasion.
The German government at the time of the invasion, led by former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, was strongly very opposed to the war.
Those against the investigation argued that the false accusation of Khaled el-Masri and his arrest had already been looked at by another parliamentary panel which oversees the activities of the intelligence services, the opposition managed to get enough votes to establish a inquiry panel.
The current coalition government, formed by Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Schroeder's Social Democratic Party (SPD), could get trouble by the panels conclusions.
Schroeder, former Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer and his current successor, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, will all be questioned. Steinmeier was Schroeder's chief of staff at the time and was responsible for overseeing the intelligence services.
All testimonies will be public.
Sources:
- 2006-04-08: (xiahunet) German parliament investigates spy affair in Iraq war +
- 2006-04-07: (upi) Germany probes Iraq scandal, CIA links +
- 2006-04-08: (chinabroadcast) German Parliament Investigates Spy Affair in Iraq War +
- 2006-04-07: German lawmakers to vote on investigating whether aided U.S. forces in Iraq war +