l****z
发帖数: 29846 | 1 John Brennan issues apology after acknowledging that agency spied on Senate
intelligence committee’s staff members
The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, John Brennan, issued an
extraordinary apology to leaders of the US Senate intelligence committee on
Thursday, conceding that the agency employees spied on committee staff and
reversing months of furious and public denials.
Brennan acknowledged that an internal investigation had found agency
security personnel transgressed a firewall set up on a CIA network, called
RDINet, which allowed Senate committee investigators to review agency
documents for their landmark inquiry into CIA torture.
The admission brings Brenan’s already rocky tenure at the head of the CIA
under renewed question. One senator on the panel said he had lost confidence
in Brennan.
“Some CIA employees acted in a manner inconsistent with the common
understanding reached between SSCI and the CIA in 2009 regarding access to
the RDINet,” CIA spokesman Dean Boyd said in a statement to reporters,
using the acronym for the Senate select committee on intelligence.
In March, the committee chairwoman, Senator Dianne Feinstein of California,
accused the agency of violating constitutional boundaries by spying on the
Senate.
Feinstein has yet to comment on the CIA statement. But Mark Udall of
Colorado, a Demorat on the Senate panel, tweeted that “Brennan misled
public” and pledged to “fight for change at the CIA”.
But her fellow committee member Mark Udall, a Colorado Democrat, called
Brennan’s future into question.
“From the unprecedented hacking of congressional staff computers and
continued leaks undermining the Senate intelligence committee’s
investigation of the CIA’s detention and interrogation program to his
abject failure to acknowledge any wrongdoing by the agency, I have lost
confidence in John Brennan,” Udall said.
“I also believe the administration should appoint an independent counsel to
look into what I believe could be the violation of multiple provisions of
the Constitution as well as federal criminal statutes and executive order
12333,” he added, referring to a Reagan-era presidential directive defining
the roles of the intelligence agencies.
.@CIA IG rprt shows John Brennan misled public, whose interests I have
championed. I will fight for change at the CIA:http://t.co/uQVsvV43nB
— Mark Udall (@MarkUdall) July 31, 2014
Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat on the panel and one of the agency’s
harsher critics, said the CIA inspector general had vindicated the committee
but stopped short of calling for Brennan’s resignation.
“What’s needed now is a public apology from director Brennan to staff and
the committee, a full accounting of how this occurred and a commitment there
will be no further attempts to undermine Congressional oversight of CIA
activities,” Wyden said.
Boyd said Brennan has asked a former committee member, Evan Bayh, a former
Indiana Democratic senator, to review the recommendations of the agency
inspector general – which vindicated Feinstein and prompted Brennan’s
apology – and advise Brennan on next steps.
That advice, Boyd said, “could include potential disciplinary measures and/
or steps to address systemic issues.”
Steve Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists, a longtime
observer of the CIA, called its Thursday statement a “conciliatory gesture
” to the committee’s leaders. “If Senator Feinstein is satisfied with the
apology then the affair is effectively over. If she contends there was a
fundamental breach that cannot be corrected with a mere apology then some
further action might be needed,” Aftergood said.
McClatchy first reported the apology on Thursday.
Feinstein, in her dramatic speech on the Senate floor in March, said the
agency breached the firewall to obstruct the committee’s investigation of
the agency’s torture of post-9/11 terrorism detainees, a years-long effort
expected to be partially declassified in the coming days or weeks. That
investigation was itself prompted by a different coverup: the destruction of
videotapes of brutal interrogations by a senior official, Jose Rodriguez. | w*****s
发帖数: 2896 | 2 哈哈, FBI and CIA, 在左逼党的领导下, 都成了一路货了. |
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