Sunday, April 09, 2006

SISMI and Niger forgeries

* Downing Street Memo guy Mick Smith falls for a whopper:
"TWO employees of the Niger embassy in Rome were responsible for the forgery of a notorious set of documents used to help justify the Iraq war, an official investigation has allegedly found.

According to Nato sources, the investigation has evidence that Niger’s consul and its ambassador’s personal assistant faked a contract to show Saddam Hussein had bought uranium ore from the impoverished west African country.
[...]
According to the sources, an official investigation believes Adam Maiga Zakariaou, the consul, and Laura Montini, the ambassador’s assistant, known as La Signora, forged the papers for money." (link)
Josh:
"Now, remember, this version of events is the work of an Italian government 'investigation'. And all evidence suggests that the Italian government has very dirty hands in this whole affair, acting at least as the purveyor of the forgeries and possibly their creator as well.
[]
This is the cover story concocted by the Italian government. It wasn't a very good one eighteen months ago and it's no better now"

and Josh:
"Look closely. If this is an accurate representation of what the story will contain, it is about an Italian government investigation. That's all you need to know.

The Italian intelligence services were centrally involved in the clandestine distribution of the forgeries and in all likelihood the creation of the forgeries themselves. Everything the Italian government has done since then has been to impede any outside investigation into their role.

There's simply no reason to credit anything an Italian government investigation of this matter reveals. If anything, its findings are probably a good bet to be the exact opposite of what is in fact the case. And the timing of such a release is no doubt in response to indications that at least two US news organizations will release new, damaging revelations about their role in the not-too-distant future."
i wish someone would leak that damn 60 minutes report. can we FOIA it?

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