Italian court sentences 23 US citizens in imam kidnapping (Roundup)

Nov 4, 2009, 17:44 GMT

Milan - A Milan court on Wednesday sentenced 23 US citizens in absentia to several-year prison terms for the broad-daylight kidnapping of a Muslim cleric six years earlier.

The case concerned the 2003 kidnapping of Abu Omar, who was seized on a street in Milan, then flown via the US air base at Ramstein, Germany, to Egypt where he was held until 2007 without being charged.

The kidnappers were believed to have been CIA agents in what became a CIA rendition operation.

The Milan court had been hearing the case over the past two-and-a- half years against a total of 26 US nationals and seven Italians, including a former head of the Italian secret service Sismi, Nicolo Pollari.

Pollari, as well as three of the US defendants, were covered by diplomatic immunity.

Milan prosecutors issued an extradition request for the Americans in 2007, but the government in Rome refused to process it, citing the need to protect secrecy in relations between the Italian and US governments.

This secrecy was referred to by Judge Oscar Magi on Wednesday when he explained the dropping of charges against Pollari.

Two other Sismi former agents were sentenced by the court, which ordered those convicted to pay the Muslim cleric 1 million euros (1.48 million dollars) in compensation.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who was in power when the abduction occurred, has said several times his government had no knowledge of of the kidnapping.

Pollari also said he was unaware of illegal CIA activities in Italy.