It all began with the kidnapping of terror suspect known as
Abu Omar, a Egyptian radical mullah who was lifted off the streets of Milan
(Italy) on 17 February 2003, in what was termed as an ‘extraordinary rendition’
and transported by special aircraft to Egypt, where the local ‘mukhabarat’
(secret police) tortured him for almost 7 months for information.
Abu Omar was suspected to have been a recruiter of jihadists
for Abu Musab al- Zarqawi (the father of the ISIS / Islamic State) who was then
operating in Northern Iraq.
The operation included 18 U.S ‘contractors’ on-the-ground who believed that the Italian Secret Service (SISMI) had approved of their
operation and would not interfere.
But, either out of arrogance or sheer
incompetence, they had not consulted with the police or the courts in
Italy. Not only they carried out the
operation in full view of witnesses, but when Abu Omar got out of jail in Egypt
and called his wife (who was still in Italy, and whose phone was being
monitored by SISMI) the details of the operation were revealed by the victim
himself, and these could not be ignored since the wiretap details were being
submitted to the local Courts as evidence against potential terror activities.
To add to the evidence; the kidnappers had left a trail of
phone calls, hotel reservations, and vehicles rented on official credit cards;
allowing the Italian investigators to put together a highly detailed picture of
the activities of the CIA before, during and after the operation. The persons who were identified through this
investigation were the military pilots who handled the flight out of Italy to
Germany and on-wards to Egypt, the then CIA Station Chief Jeffrey Castelli,
senior CIA agent Robert Seldon and of course the accused spy Sabrina De Sousa
(the focus of this story).
Born in Mumbai (Bombay – India) of Goan heritage, Sabrina
married a serving U.S. diplomat and became a naturalized American citizen. Due
to her fluency in multiple European languages and her connection to the
diplomatic community, she ended up working for the CIA and at the time of this
fiasco was posted to the U.S. Embassy in Rome. She holds dual nationality of
Portugal and USA and has relatives in Portugal as well as in India. The Italian
courts have determined from evidence available to them that De Sousa was the
planner of the kidnap operation and that she actively monitored the kidnap from
planning to delivery of the victim to Egyptian authorities.
De Sousa, as can be expected, denies the
criminal charges against her.
So, where did she screw up?
Firstly, De Sousa (assuming that
she was actually the CIA case officer for this operation) came to Italy on a
diplomatic passport and was attached as a Consular officer. This would have
brought her straight under the EU / Italian surveillance microscope, where her
activities in public would have been monitored routinely.
Secondly, she put together a team that was shoddy in their
operational procedures and left behind a trail that the prosecutors could
easily follow.
Thirdly, she wrongly assumed that diplomatic cover for an
operative at the consulate, even those carrying diplomatic passports; is not a
guarantee of diplomatic immunity from prosecution.
Had she gone to Italy as an ‘dark operator’, isolated
herself from the U.S. Gov and its various services and most importantly; used
third-party contractors paid in cash to catch her ‘fish’ and have it
transported to Egypt using a tramp cargo vessel ; she would have achieved her
objective without anybody being the wiser and with full deniability.
De Sousa claims that she was following orders which were
issued at the highest level of the U.S. Government (which basically means the
President). But, executing these orders on-the-ground is the responsibility of the operatives
and here she and her team (as also her bosses in Europe) failed miserably.
Today, De Sousa is legally detained in Portugal under a EU
arrest warrant in her name and would be produced in an Italian court-room in
the next few days. While she has been convicted in absentia by the Italian
Courts earlier (and given a four year prison sentence); it’s possible that she
can demand and get a re-trial.
A re-trial would be nightmare coming alive to the
CIA and the Italian intelligence agency, since many old operational records
would have to be made public as evidence, both by the prosecution and the
defense legal teams; and this might lead to further and potentially damaging
information of parallel spy operations of those days.
Currently, Sabrina De Sousa is the only person who is poised
to go to jail for the kidnap. Her old bosses Castelli and Seldon were pardoned
by Italy’s President Matarella in 2015; and gave a tactic understanding to the
CIA that Italy would not push for the extradition of any of the U.S operatives
who were involved in the kidnap.
De Sousa tempted fate by travelling to Portugal, while being
fully aware of the EU arrest warrant against her and has approached U.S
President Trump to intervene in her case. The world over, spies are waiting to
observe the fate of De Sousa; which would definitely impact operational
procedures drastically.
Author:
‘Sardar’ Sanjay Matkar
25 February
2017
Twitter:
@sanjaymatkar
Information for this article sourced from public sources.
UPDATE: LISBON, March 9 (Reuters) -
A former U.S. spy, newly pardoned by Italy in connection with the CIA kidnap of a terrorism suspect in Milan, has credited President Donald Trump's administration with saving her from an Italian jail. https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/03/09/ex-cia-spy-credits-trump-for-saving-her-from-italian-jail/21877653/
