Pre-War Prisoner Lied about Al-Qaeda
A key prewar Bush administration claim about ties between Iraq and al-Qaida reportedly came from a prisoner who said he made it up to avoid harsh treatment.
The New York Times, quoting current and former government officials, said the captive, Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi provided his most specific and elaborate accounts about ties between Iraq and al-Qaida after he was secretly handed over to Egypt by the United States in January 2002, in a process known as rendition.
The Bush administration used Libi‘s accounts as the basis for its prewar assertions, now discredited, that ties between Iraq and al-Qaida included training in explosives and chemical weapons.
The disclosure provides the first public evidence that bad intelligence on Iraq may have resulted partly from the administration’s heavy reliance on third countries to carry out interrogations of al-Qaida members and others detained as part of U.S. counterterrorism efforts.
Source: 104.7 The Bear.
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