Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Buh-bye, Khaled. Or should that be Auf Weidersehen?

Court nixes man’s suit claiming torture by CIA: Justices throw out German’s challenge to alleged abduction by U.S. agents:

They rejected his appeal without comment. Ouch!

The Supreme Court on Tuesday terminated a lawsuit from a man who claims he was abducted and tortured by the CIA, effectively endorsing Bush administration arguments that state secrets would be revealed if the case were allowed to proceed.

Khaled el-Masri, 44, alleged that he was kidnapped by CIA agents in Europe and held in an Afghan prison for four months in a case of mistaken identity.

The administration has not publicly acknowledged that el-Masri was detained, and lower courts dismissed his suit after the administration asserted that state secrets would be revealed if the lawsuit were not blocked. The justices rejected his appeal without comment.