Posted on 11/03/2005 10:08:53 AM PST by sonsofliberty2000
ROME (AP) An Italian lawmaker says the government warned the United States before the Iraq war that documents about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium in Africa were forged.
Who did they tell? The CIA? The CIA wanted the WH to believe the docs were real. The CIA did not object to the WH relying on the docs.
Why did they just remember this now????
you think the CIA would own up to this? A conspiracy is being laid out, and I think it is a conspiracy amongst liberal lawmakers and CIA bureaucrats.
Why are the Brits still sticking by their intelligence? And who cares what the Italians say. Bush spoke of the Brits, not the Italians.
Forged by the French
ROME (AP) An Italian lawmaker says the government warned the United States before the Iraq war that documents about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium in Africa were forged.
President Bush's Speach was not based on the Phoney Italian Documents.
How long do we have to keep hearing this rehash of a NON story?
What lawmaker? What party does he belong to?
Cause the Democrats did phase one, sending the Senate into secret session, and escalating the story. Now someone is raising it to a global level. Soon the UN will be involved.
ROME (AP) An Italian lawmaker says the government warned the United States before the Iraq war that documents about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium in Africa were forged.
Wow, thanks for that illumination, Italy. That's probably why we relied on BRITISH intelligence for the Niger info, just like we'd always said? A stupid, strawman argument if there ever was one.
Owl_Eagle
(If what I just wrote makes you sad or angry,
Well, the Italians have been right in the past so often. Just ask the Somalis
This is all I have so far.
On Yahoo earlier today. Is this what you are referring too?
Italian Officials Questioned on Iraq Claim
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051103/ap_on_re_eu/italy_iraq_uranium_2
By ARIEL DAVID, Associated Press Writer
ROME - Italian lawmakers questioned Premier Silvio Berlusconi's top aide and an intelligence chief Thursday about allegations that Italy knowingly gave the United States and Britain forged documents suggesting Saddam Hussein was seeking uranium in Africa.
Cabinet Undersecretary Gianni Letta and Nicolo Pollari, the director of Italy's SISMI intelligence agency, were questioned by members of a parliamentary commission overseeing secret services.
The hearing in Rome was not open to the public, but commission members were expected to talk to reporters later.
Pollari requested the hearing after the daily newspaper La Repubblica said last week that Italy gave the United States and Britain documents it knew were forged detailing a purported Iraqi deal to buy 500 tons of uranium concentrate from Niger. The uranium ore, known as yellowcake, can be used to produce nuclear weapons.
The United States and Britain used the claim to bolster the case for war. The intelligence supporting the claim later was deemed unreliable.
La Repubblica, a strong Berlusconi opponent, has alleged that after the Sept. 11 attacks Pollari was being pressured by Berlusconi a strong U.S. ally to make a strong contribution to the hunt for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
Berlusconi's government has denied any wrongdoing, and the premier has personally defended Pollari in the face of calls for his resignation.
Berlusconi, in an interview with the conservative daily newspaper Libero published Thursday, said Italy had not passed any documents on the Niger affair to the United States. He added that La Repubblica's allegations were dangerous for Italy because "if they were believed, we would be considered the instigator" of the Iraq war.
The Niger claim also is at the center of a CIA leak scandal that has shaken the Bush administration, leading to last week's indictment of Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis Libby.
Libby was charged with lying to investigators about leaking the identity of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame, the wife of Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson.
Wilson accused the administration of covering up his inquiry into whether Iraq was trying to obtain uranium from Niger after he found the claim had no substance.
Maybe Valerie or Jacqueline are are in Italy, not in France??
This is news? Joe Wilson told us that before the US ever laid eyes on them.
The documents were not the sole source for the claim.
Boycott Peroni! LOL
Italian Officials Questioned on Iraq Claim
ROME - Italian lawmakers questioned Premier Silvio Berlusconi's top aide and an intelligence chief Thursday about allegations that Italy knowingly gave the United States and Britain forged documents suggesting Saddam Hussein was seeking uranium in Africa.
Cabinet Undersecretary Gianni Letta and Nicolo Pollari, the director of Italy's SISMI intelligence agency, were questioned by members of a parliamentary commission overseeing secret services.
The hearing in Rome was not open to the public, but commission members were expected to talk to reporters later.
Pollari requested the hearing after the daily newspaper La Repubblica said last week that Italy gave the United States and Britain documents it knew were forged detailing a purported Iraqi deal to buy 500 tons of uranium concentrate from Niger. The uranium ore, known as yellowcake, can be used to produce nuclear weapons.
The United States and Britain used the claim to bolster the case for war. The intelligence supporting the claim later was deemed unreliable.
La Repubblica, a strong Berlusconi opponent, has alleged that after the Sept. 11 attacks Pollari was being pressured by Berlusconi a strong U.S. ally to make a strong contribution to the hunt for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
Berlusconi's government has denied any wrongdoing, and the premier has personally defended Pollari in the face of calls for his resignation.
Berlusconi, in an interview with the conservative daily newspaper Libero published Thursday, said Italy had not passed any documents on the Niger affair to the United States. He added that La Repubblica's allegations were dangerous for Italy because "if they were believed, we would be considered the instigator" of the Iraq war.
The Niger claim also is at the center of a CIA leak scandal that has shaken the Bush administration, leading to last week's indictment of Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis Libby.
Libby was charged with lying to investigators about leaking the identity of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame, the wife of Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson.
Wilson accused the administration of covering up his inquiry into whether Iraq was trying to obtain uranium from Niger after he found the claim had no substance.
UPdate
Italy Warned U.S. About Uranium Documents
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051103/ap_on_re_eu/italy_iraq_uranium;_ylt=AvxoxIMrufK9.moItHqyeWVvaA8F;_ylu=X3oDMTA5aHJvMDdwBHNlYwN5bmNhdA--
By ARIEL DAVID, Associated Press Writer
2 minutes ago
ROME - Italian secret services warned the United States months before it invaded Iraq that a dossier about a purported Saddam Hussein effort to buy uranium in Africa was fake, a lawmaker said Thursday after a briefing by the nation's intelligence chief.
"At about the same time as the State of the Union address, they (Italy's SISMI secret services) said that the dossier doesn't correspond to the truth," Sen. Massimo Brutti told journalists after the parliamentary commission was briefed.
Brutti said the warning was given in January 2003, but he did not know whether it was made before or after President Bush's speech.
The United States and Britain used the claim that Saddam was seeking to buy uranium in Niger to bolster their case for the war. The intelligence supporting the claim later was deemed unreliable.
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