News you may have missed #0082

August 27, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • The spy who prayed. Profile of As’ad Said Ali, deputy chief of Indonesia’s National Intelligence Agency, who is actively involved in Nahdlatul Ulama, Indonesia’s largest Muslim organization.
  • Shadowy Turkish group used journalists as spies. Ergenekon, a shadowy ultranationalist network with strong links to the Turkish armed forces, which planned to topple the Turkish government, used journalists to spy on its high-profile targets, according to court documents.
  • CIA sacked Baghdad station chief after deaths. The CIA removed its station chief in Iraq and reorganized its operations there in late 2003, following “potentially very serious leadership lapses” that included the deaths of detainees in US custody.

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French spy escapes Somali captors, allegedly killing three

August 27, 2009 by Leave a comment

Hotel Sahafi

Hotel Sahafi

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
One of two French intelligence agents arrested by a Somali militia in July has escaped, after allegedly killing three of his captors. Somali military officer Farhan Asanyo told British newspaper The Daily Mail that the Frenchman approached government soldiers in Mogadishu early yesterday morning, identified himself and said he had escaped. He was then taken to the Presidential Palace in Mogadishu, where he now remains. The French Foreign Ministry has disputed Asanyo’s account, saying that the French intelligence agent escaped without resorting to violence and without a ransom having been paid by Paris. Read more of this post

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CIA loses turf war as new US interrogation unit is unveiled

August 27, 2009 by 3 Comments

CIA HQ

CIA HQ

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
The CIA appears to have been stripped of its senior role in America’s post-9/11 interrogation program, as the Obama Administration announced this week the creation of a new interrogation unit. The new High-Value Detainee Interrogation Group (HIG) will be an elite interagency squad, which will report to the National Security Council and answer directly to the White House. But, according to several insiders, the unit will be housed at the FBI, and not the CIA. The two agencies have been fighting a bitter turf war after 9/11. Officials at Langley view this development as a severe blow to the Agency, which the Bush Administration had tasked with overseeing America’s post 9/11 interrogation program. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #0081

August 27, 2009 by Leave a comment

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News you may have missed #0080

August 26, 2009 by Leave a comment

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World poring over released CIA documents

August 26, 2009 by Leave a comment

CIA report cover

CIA report cover

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
It will take some time before the world’s media and other interested parties manage to comb through the recently released report (.pdf) by the CIA inspector general, as well as a host of other newly declassified documents pertaining to the Agency’s post-9/11 interrogation program. The volume of data is so extensive that some news outlets are apparently requesting assistance from readers. The report on the CIA’s counterterrorism detention and interrogation activities between 2001 and 2003 is not new. It was originally produced in May of 2004 and was released in 2008 by the Bush Administration, in a heavily redacted version. Although the current release is less heavily redacted, several observers have questioned the wisdom of remaining redactions (the National Security Archive has published a useful side-by-side comparison of the Bush and Obama Administration versions of the report). Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #0079

August 26, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • Berlin football club cancels deal over Stasi controversy. FC Union Berlin has dumped its main sponsor, International Sport Promotion, over allegations that its CEO, Juergen Czilinsky, was a member of the Stasi, the East German secret police.
  • US officials targeted by fake emails. Malicious emails claiming to be from the US Department of Homeland Security, but which actually originate from Latvia and Russia, are being sent to Pentagon and state and local officials in the US. Similar news emerged from Australia last week.
  • Emirates expel Thai ex-premier. Ousted former Thai premier Thaksin Shinawatra was expelled by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Tuesday, and has gone to Montenegro. Interestingly, Montenegrin authorities have supplied Thaksin with a Montenegrin passport.

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CIA certified interrogators after two-week training

August 26, 2009 by Leave a comment

Dick Cheney

Dick Cheney

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Among numerous revelations in the CIA interrogations documents, released Monday, is information which suggests that the Agency haphazardly certified spies as “interrogators” after training them for only two weeks. Canadian newspaper The Toronto Star appears to be the only news source that has picked up on the revelation, noting that it takes twice that long to train an individual to drive a truck in the United States. It appears that the CIA resorted to the haphazard certification process shortly after 9/11; never prior to that time had the Agency been involved in the interrogation business on a large scale. The documents also show that, until 2003, Langley routinely supplied CIA interrogators with conduct rules that tended to change from case to case. Read more of this post

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Libyan’s release prevented “explosive” appeal hearing, says ex-CIA agent

August 25, 2009 by Leave a comment

Robert Baer

Robert Baer

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
As intelNews anticipated, Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi was released last week by British authorities. Al-Megrahi, who allegedly has terminal cancer, was convicted in 2001 for his role in the Lockerbie air disaster, but has now been allowed to return to Libya in order to die in his homeland. But former CIA agent Robert Baer has repeated charges that the Libyan prisoner was released so at to prevent his legal team from filing an appeal, which Baer believes would have proven beyond doubt that Iran, not Libya, was behind the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103. As The London Times has reported before, al-Megrahi’s legal team is in possession of several US government documents on the case, including a report by the US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which says that the attack was “conceived, authorized and financed” by Ali-Akbar Mohtashemi-Pur (alternative spelling: Ali-Akbar Mohtashamipur), Iran’s Minister of Interior during the early years of the Islamic Revolution. Read more of this post

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More information on ex-French spy’s escape from Dubai

August 25, 2009 by 1 Comment

Herve Jaubert

Herve Jaubert

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
New information has emerged on former French spy Herve Jaubert’s alleged secret escape from Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), which intelNews reported last week. British newspaper The Sunday Telegraph has published an article with details of Jaubert’s escape, including a photograph of the former spy dressed in a black abaya, a head-to-toe burka traditionally worn by Muslim women in the Persian Gulf. Jaubert left Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE), France’s foreign intelligence agency, in 1993, to pursue a career in the luxury tourist market, first in Florida and then in Dubai. But less than a year ago, Emirates authorities accused the Frenchman of embezzling nearly $4 million from Dubai World, a company he helped found in the country. Jaubert says he was threatened with torture by overzealous Emirates authorities and decided to escape, despite having been forced to surrender his French passport. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #0078

August 25, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • Indian police claims busting of Pakistani spy ring. Punjab Police claims to have arrested a member of a spy ring allegedly handled by Pakistani intelligence (ISI). The arrestee was reportedly trying to leave India for Pakistan at the time of his arrest.
  • Iraq intelligence chief retired before major blasts. Mohammed al-Shehwani, the head of the Iraqi National Intelligence Service, went into retirement days before huge bombings in Baghdad killed almost 100 people in the deadliest day of violence this year.
  • Backlash over plan to spy on Indonesian mosques. Indonesian religious leaders are warning that the Indonesian National Police’s plan to monitor religious sermons during Ramadan will offend and anger Muslims, and be viewed as a repeat of tactics employed during the hated Suharto regime.

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News you may have missed #0077

August 24, 2009 by Leave a comment

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Israeli secret agents guarding Palestinian President, Prime Minister

August 24, 2009 by Leave a comment

Mahmoud Abbas

Mahmoud Abbas

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Israeli agents of Shin Bet are guarding Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on their trips around some parts of the West Bank, Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz revealed last week. The report comes days after jeeps with agents from the VIP security unit of Israel’s secret service were observed escorting Abbas during his visits to Palestinian villages located in so-called “Area C”, a region of the West Bank that continues to remain under Israeli control, in accordance with the 1993 Oslo Accords. Both Palestinian and Israeli officials have confirmed this peculiar arrangement, which is bound to add to the animosity between the Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority, which rules the West Bank, and Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip. The Israeli government said that the same procedures are in effect when foreign officials visit Area C, and that it guards the Palestinian Authority President whenever he visits Israel.

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Taliban execute Mehsud’s family members on espionage charges

August 24, 2009 by Leave a comment

Baitullah Mehsud

Baitullah Mehsud

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Four relatives of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud were reportedly arrested last week by Taliban militants, who suspect them of having informed Pakistani and US intelligence about Mehsud’s whereabouts. Pakistani and US officials say they are almost certain that Mehsud was killed in an unmanned drone air strike (probably remotely operated by the CIA) earlier this month. Mehsud’s family members arrested by the Taliban include his father-in-law, Ikramuddin Mehsud, his son, Ziauddin Mehsud, his brother, Saeedullah Mehsud, and his nephew, Iqbal Mehsud. Earlier today, Pakistan’s Interior Minister, Rehman Malik, told reporters that the Taliban have executed Mehsud’s family members, listed above, after “confirming” their espionage activities. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #0076

August 24, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • Revealing CIA report published today. The CIA is expected to come under some of its toughest scrutiny for years, after the publication today of a report detailing the agency’s use of mock executions, and the threatening of detainees with power drills and guns during interrogations.
  • North Korean spy director meets South Korean officials. South Korean President Lee Myung-bak met a delegation of visiting North Korean officials on Sunday, including Kim Yang Gon who heads the United Front Department (UFD), an intelligence agency under the Korean Worker’s Party (KWP) of the DPRK.
  • Changes imminent at South African spy agency. The administration of President Jacob Zuma intends to move to restructure South Africa’s National Intelligence Agency (NIA), the country’s primary domestic spy organization. In July, a former member of South Africa’s ministerial Review Commission on Intelligence warned that a steadily declining culture of accountability in the country’s spy services is threatening the country’s constitutional order.

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