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Fbi cia denies employee afghan freelancer { August 17 2004 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/17/international/asia/17afghan.htmlhttp://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/17/international/asia/17afghan.html
August 17, 2004
FREELANCERS
Three on Trial in Afghanistan Gain Access to F.B.I. Files
By CARLOTTA GALL
KABUL, Afghanistan, Aug. 16 - Three Americans on trial Monday on charges that they ran a vigilante jail and interrogation operation here accused the F.B.I. of removing evidence needed for their defense, and they were given a seven-day extension to prepare after the agency returned the evidence later that day.
One of the defendants, Jonathan K. Idema, a former Special Forces soldier who says he was running a legitimate counterterrorism effort, said that the F.B.I. had taken videotapes, photographs and documents that had been seized from his house by Afghan authorities after his arrest on July 5, and that the American Embassy in Kabul had then blocked all access to it.
He said the evidence would show that the F.B.I., the C.I.A. and the military had approved his operation, even though the United States government has denied any connection with it or the defendants. "Everyone knew what we were doing," he said. "We were not in the United States military, but we were working with the United States military."
Mr. Idema was defending himself, and he appeared to speak for another defendant, Brent Bennett, 28, a former soldier who was silent during the daylong session. Their defense lawyers had not yet arrived from the United States, Mr. Idema said.
Michael Skibbie, an American member of the team defending Edward Caraballo, the third American, made similar accusations about lacking access to evidence. The defense team had been promised the material by the embassy by the end of last week, he said, but it had not arrived. "We had to finalize our defense without the evidence," he told the court.
He said the F.B.I. contacted him just hours before the trial to say it was giving back the documents to the National Security Directorate, from which they had been taken. "Returning substantial evidence after the trial begins shows an incredible insult to the Afghan justice system, an insult to the court and to the defense," he said. He added that because the evidence had not been seen before it was taken by the F.B.I., it was impossible to know if parts of it had been lost or mislaid while in its hands. He asked the court to request a report from the agency detailing where the evidence had been held and by whom.
Judge Abdul Baset Bakhtiari, presiding over the trial, agreed to a week's extension to allow the defendants access to the returned evidence.
The prosecutor, Muhammad Naeem Dawari, repeated the charges against the three Americans of entering the country illegally, running an illegal jail, operating with illegal weapons and illegally imprisoning people.
The prosecution had eight witnesses who were held prisoner in Mr. Idema's house and also had instruments of torture and video footage found in the house, he said. He accused the four Afghans arrested with them - two translators, a cleaner and a guard - of being accomplices to the illegal operations. All of the defendants pleaded not guilty.
Mr. Idema denied accounts by witnesses in pretrial hearings that he had tortured detainees. "No one was hung up by their feet; no one's fingers were cut off; no one's head was beaten," he said. "We used very standard interrogation techniques."
Despite repeated requests from the judge to answer the question of how he entered the country and under what authorization he had been operating, Mr. Idema answered neither question directly. He showed flashes of contempt and anger at the proceedings, complaining about poor translation and microphones.
"I can't defend myself like this," he said. "Just give me 15 years and let's get it over with. Or hang me and let the others go free."
Mr. Caraballo, a freelance journalist who has won four Emmy awards for his work, said he had come to Afghanistan to document on film "that Afghanistan is America's best Muslim ally." In a statement he read to the court, he said he had come to Afghanistan with Mr. Idema because of his extensive knowledge of the area and his experience fighting alongside the anti-Taliban resistance in 2001.
After seeing high-level meetings with Afghan and American officials and military officers, he said, he believed that Mr. Idema's operation had been approved by both the Afghan and American governments.
After the trial, he told journalists that after coming to Afghanistan, he had sent photographs to his agency, Polaris, and video footage to Dan Rather, the CBS News anchor.
A spokeswoman for CBS News, Kelli Edwards, said Edward Caraballo was not working for the network, although he had done some freelance work for it in the past. CBS did not broadcast any of his recent video footage from Afghanistan, she said.
The judge rejected a request that Mr. Caraballo's case be dealt with separately because he was a journalist, saying he would be tried with the group because he had been present and filming throughout their operations.
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
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