Former CIA officer indicted on charges of leaking classified information to journalists

Source: Associated Press

WASHINGTON — A former CIA officer who expressed public doubts over the use of waterboarding as an interrogation technique was indicted on Thursday on charges that he leaked classified secrets to journalists, including the role of an associate who worked with him on a covert mission to track down and capture a top al-Qaida figure.

The indictment of John C. Kiriakou, returned by a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Va., is part of an aggressive ongoing Justice Department crackdown on leakers and is one of a half-dozen such cases opened during the Obama administration.

The five-count indictment charges Kiriakou, who was arrested in January, with divulging to journalists the role of an associate who participated in the capture of suspected al-Qaida financier Abu Zubaydah in the months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The officer’s participation in that mission was classified.

The indictment also accuses Kiriakou of separately disclosing a covert officer’s name to an unidentified journalist. The government began investigating after information about that officer appeared in a sealed legal brief submitted by lawyers for a detainee at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, facility that holds terrorism suspects. Authorities say the journalist provided to the officer’s name to a defense team investigator. The defense lawyers are not alleged to have done anything wrong.

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