Newsreel

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Intelligence sweep

HOURS before arriving in Egypt on Monday for talks with President Hosni Mubarak as part of Italy's efforts to push for a European peace plan for the Middle East, Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi fired the head of his military intelligence agency, one of several Italian intelligence officials being investigated in the alleged CIA abduction of an Egyptian cleric in Milan in 2003. In what was described as a major sweep, Nicolo Pollari was replaced as head of military intelligence, while the chiefs of the civilian secret service agency SISDE and CESIS, which coordinates the country's intelligence services, were also removed.

Pollari, also linked in a fake dossier about a fictitious Iraqi deal to buy uranium, had long resisted calls for his resignation. The chiefs of the two other services were not named in the scandal, and the government insisted the replacements were part of a broader overhaul of intelligence agencies rather than in response to specific incidents.

In 2005, news reports in the leftist daily La Repubblica alleged that Pollari had knowingly passed forged documents to the United States suggesting that Saddam Hussein had been seeking uranium in Africa -- information that was used to bolster the case for the invasion of Iraq. Pollari denied Italy's Military Intelligence and Security Service (SISMI) had any hand in disseminating the fake dossier, which detailed a fictitious Iraqi deal to buy 500 tonnes of yellowcake uranium from Niger.

However, calls for his resignation rocketed after he became the highest ranking Italian official named in the investigation into a Muslim cleric's kidnapping, and was questioned by prosecutors in July.

Recently, prosecutors in Milan renewed their request for Italy to ask Washington to extradite 26 Americans -- all but one believed to be CIA agents -- in the alleged kidnapping of mosque preacher Osama Mustafa Hassan Nasr, alias Abu Omar. Reportedly, Abu Omar was abducted in 2003 walking down a Milan street as part of a CIA "extraordinary rendition" programme in which suspects related to terrorism are transferred to Third World countries where some allegedly are subjected to torture. Purportedly, Abu Omar was flown out of northern Italy from a military base in Aviano and, according to prosecutors, eventually taken to Egypt where he claimed to have been tortured.

The cleric's alleged abduction and torture was severely criticised by several human rights organisations and the press, describing it as a dangerous precedent.

According to Abu Omar's lawyer and wife, he was to have been released from Torah prison last month after signing documents given to him by Egyptian security denying allegations of torture. Abu Omar has yet to be released. The Italian press last week reported news of Abu Omar smuggling prison documents out of his jail cell, saying he was tortured, a claim that clearly upset authorities.

Egypt denied allegations and insisted the cleric came to Egypt "of his own will" and "turned himself in to authorities".

Pollari has insisted in questioning before parliamentary committees that Italian intelligence had no role in Abu Omar's disappearance.

In a statement issued by Prodi's office, it said that after leaving, Pollari will receive "an important special assignment" that requires reporting directly to the premier.

Pollari will be replaced by Admiral Bruno Branciforte, a fleet commander and former head of navy intelligence.

Being a woman

ACCORDING to a study on sexual harassment in Egypt, "it is not about how beautiful a woman is or what she might be wearing. As long as she is a woman."

The study, published by the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights, examines sexual harassment as a form of violence against women in Egypt. "Harassment is not related to the age of a woman because the harasser doesn't see the woman as being young or old, wearing a veil or not. He just sees her as a woman," the study said.

According to the study, school students are the No 1 victims of harassment either in public transportation or in the street.

Next to students are unemployed women, with 27 per cent; women in administrative jobs with 20 per cent; and housewives with 12 per cent.

"Thirty per cent of women in general get harassed daily," according to the study.

The study shows that touching is the most common form of harassment at 40 per cent. About 55 per cent of women usually react by insulting the harasser, 30 per cent ask for help from strangers, 10 per cent ask for help from family members or friends and 10 per cent report the incident.

Bombers on trial

ON MONDAY, the emergency Supreme State Security Court in Cairo ordered a postponement of the hearings in the trial of 14 suspects, including two women, on charges of conspiring to carry out three terrorist attacks last year.

The trial was postponed to 16 December. Defence lawyers asked the court to order forensics to determine the findings of a medical examination on the suspects. The lawyers also argued that some of the suspects accused of taking part in the Al-Azhar and Abdel-Moneim Riad bombings in April 2005 were in police custody at the time of the attacks.

In court testimony Major Ahmed Anwar from the state security forces said he was ordered to investigate the bombing in Gawhar Al-Qaid Street near Al-Azhar Mosque in Khan Al-Khalili bazaar on 7 April 2005 which killed three tourists and wounded 18 others.

Anwar was also in charge of investigating the bomb attacks of 30 April 2005 in Abdel-Moneim Riad Square which killed the perpetrator and injured seven, including four foreigners.

Anwar said the individual behind the Azhar attack was identified using DNA tests as 18-year-old engineering student Hassan Raafat Bashandi, a resident of Shubra Al-Kheima who attended the Benha branch of Zaqaziq University.

Eleven suspects attended the hearings behind bars while one was unable to attend for health reasons. Two women suspects were released on bail pending further investigation.

The suspects were accused of possessing unlicensed weapons, ammunitions and explosives with the aim of harming public security.

They were also accused of being members of a terrorist group which described Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak an infidel and aimed to carry out attacks targeting tourists and security officials.

Suspect extradited

AN EGYPTIAN suspect in the 2004 Madrid subway bombings has been transferred from Italy to Spain.

Rabie Osman Ahmed, also known as Mohamed El-Masri, was arrested in Milan, Italy, three months after the 11 March 2004 bombings which killed 191 people and wounded 2,000.

An Italian court convicted El-Masri for being a member of an international terrorist network and sentenced him to 10 years in jail. El-Masri's lawyers at the time said he was likely to be extradited to Spain which holds 29 suspects in the bombings.

El-Masri's lawyers described the extradition as temporary, "executed upon the request of the Spanish court." They told news agencies that he is likely to be returned to Italy to continue his sentence pending a court ruling on an appeal that he presented to an Italian court.

Before being sentenced, El-Masri described his trial as a "political trial against Islam".

El-Masri, who was not in Spain during the bomb attack, was accused of being the mastermind. According to a police recording of phone calls between El-Masri and those responsible for the blast, El-Masri was accountable for choosing the time and place of the attack.

More train accidents

AT LEAST 22 people were injured yesterday when a passenger train collided with a truck in the town of Zagazig, 80 kilometres north of Cairo, security sources said.

Further details were not available by the time Al-Ahram Weekly went to press.

The crash was the latest in a series of transport accidents that have sparked public anger over what critics call the government's failure to enforce safety standards. In August, a train crash in the Nile Delta town of Qalyoub claimed the lives of 58 people in Egypt's worst rail disaster in four years.

Compiled by Salonaz Sami