Milan judge says CIA trial continues

[May 20, 2009]  MILAN (AP) -- The trial of 26 Americans and seven Italians accused of orchestrating a CIA-led kidnapping of an Egyptian terror suspect will continue, an Italian judge ruled Wednesday.

Judge Oscar Magi decided the politically sensitive trial could continue after Italy's Supreme Court threw out key evidence that it said was classified.

Magi announced the decision at a hearing in Milan, and adjourned the trial to next week.

The two-year-old trial is the first by any government over the CIA's extraordinary renditions program.

Successive Italian governments have denied any involvement in the Feb. 17, 2003 abduction of Egyptian cleric Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, also known as Abu Omar. He was taken from a Milan street in daylight.

The American defendants -- mostly CIA agents -- have been tried in absentia. All have court-appointed lawyers who have had no contact with their clients. The CIA has refused to comment on the case.

[Associated Press]

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