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WASHINGTON: US lawmakers on Sunday demanded a probe into allegations that former vice-president Dick Cheney gave direct orders to the CIA to conceal from Congress a covert counter-terrorism programme.
The existence of the programme, set up after 9/11, was hidden for eight years and even now its nature is not known. But some US media reports suggest that the programme may have involved torture and possibly assassinations.
Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, called the failure to inform Congress ‘illegal’.
‘We have a system of checks and balances. There is accountability in our Constitution. The executive branch cannot create these kinds of programmes ... and leave Congress in the dark. (It) is not only inappropriate, it is illegal.’
Senator John McCain, the former Republican presidential candidate, told NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’ he believed Mr Cheney should respond since the accusations were aimed squarely at him.
‘I think it’s frankly too early for me to reach any conclusion,’ Mr McCain said, adding, ‘If I know Washington, this is the beginning of a pretty involved and detailed story.’
Senator Dianne Feinstein, the head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told ‘FOX News Sunday’ that Congress should have been informed about the eight-year programme sooner so that it could have oversight of the spy agency’s actions.
‘I think you weaken your case when you go outside of the law,’ Senator Feinstein said. ‘We were kept in the dark. That’s something that should never, ever happen again.’
The senator insisted that the law was very clear on this issue; the administration needs to report all such matters to Congress.
The news of Mr Cheney’s alleged involvement in a plot to hide the CIA operation from Congress came the day Attorney-General Eric Holder hinted he might allow prosecution of those Bush-era officials who endorsed excessive interrogation techniques against terror detainees.
Also, The Washington Times quoted an unnamed US official as telling its reporters that the covert programme might have involved assassinations overseas.
The leaks to the media followed CIA Director Leon Panetta’s briefing to Congress on June 24 about the still classified programme. Although it was an ‘in-camera’ briefing, some lawmakers spilled the beans, telling the media that Mr Cheney had ordered CIA officials to hide the covert programme from Congress.
Mr Panetta’s June 24 briefing to lawmakers led Democratic members of the House Intelligence Committee to demand the CIA director retract his May 15 claim that the CIA never lied or misled Congress, a remark Mr Panetta made in May after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi accused the agency of lying to her about the now-defunct enhanced interrogation programme.
Director Panetta is said to have abandoned the project when he learnt of it last month.
Mr Panetta -- who took over directorship of the CIA under President Obama’s administration -- is said to have learnt about the programme only on 23 June.
The next day he called an emergency meeting with congressional intelligence committees to tell them about its existence and to say that it was being cancelled, the reports say.
The New York Times reported on Sunday that the programme was launched by anti-terror operatives at the CIA soon after the 2001 attacks, and involved planning and training but never became fully operational.
Another unnamed official told AP it was an embryonic intelligence-gathering effort, aimed at yielding intelligence that would be used to conduct covert operations abroad.