The Washington Post Company - The story of how a Milan CIA station chief became a fugitive, now caught in Panama lyrics

BY MAX FISHER July 18, 2013 Washington Post http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/07/18/the-story-of-how-a-milan-cia-station-chief-became-a-fugitive-now-caught-in-panama/ Excerpt: Lady, according to Cole, came under pressure to seize Abu Omar and send him abroad for interrogation. He reportedly resisted at first, urging the CIA to let their joint investigation with the Italians continue, and warning that nabbing a well-known religious figure on a Western European city street could be provocative. But he was overruled and, ultimately, did as he was told, ordering the rendition to go ahead. Lady's team grabbed Abu Omar on Feb. 17 around noon, as the Egyptian was walking to a nearby mosque as he did every day. They flew him to a NATO air base in Aviano, Italy, then on to Cairo, where he was handed over to Egyptian authorities, who took several U.S.-renditioned terrorism suspects in the years after September 2001. Abu Omar surfaced again in April 2004, when an Italian phone tap picked him up calling his wife and describing what sounded, to Italian prosecutor Armando Spataro, like a U.S. rendition. Now released by the Egyptians, Abu Omar described his initial flight with English-speaking men, on a plane bearing an American flag. Spartaro told Cole that he'd already suspected Abu Omar had been renditioned by the Americans, something he considered a national embarra**ment for Italy and a violation of its sovereignty and law. And, like many in Europe, he though the renditions were wrong, little more than kidnappings. "Our system requires my office to open an investigation if there is reasonable belief that a crime has been committed," he said. "In this case, Omar's phone call to his wife was what we needed to investigate."