"US knew al-Qa'ida would attack cities with aeroplanes"

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

well actually that should be:

"I saw papers that show US knew al-Qa'ida would attack cities with aeroplanes"

This is the front page story in tomorrow's Independent -- it's Sibel Edmonds, so if you've read her previous interviews then there's nothing new here but it's wonderful to see this getting prominant coverage over here:

A former translator for the FBI with top-secret security clearance says she has provided information to the panel investigating the 11 September attacks which proves senior officials knew of al-Qa'ida's plans to attack the US with aircraft months before the strikes happened. She said the claim by the National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, that there was no such information was "an outrageous lie".

Sibel Edmonds said she spent more than three hours in a closed session with the commission's investigators providing information that was circulating within the FBI in the spring and summer of 2001 suggesting that an attack using aircraft was just months away and the terrorists were in place. The Bush administration, meanwhile, has sought to silence her and has obtained a gagging order from a court by citing the rarely used "state secrets privilege".

contd:
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=507514

[robertpaulsen]

1. YYYYYEEEEEEEEEAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LIHOP is going mainstream! I've been following Sibel Edmonds new revelations since last week when her story appeared on tomflocco.com. If you thought the BFEE had a conniption with Clarke, wait til you see how they react to Edmonds. God, this makes me happy!

[RC]

2. OK, so when will there be enough information

to impeach the bu$h&co criminals?

There reaches a point when you have enough circumstantial evidence that it becomes overwhelming evidence.

Haven't we reached that point yet?

[MasonJar]

3. How does that "state secrets" gag order work? Can she talk to

newspapers here if any of them have the integrity to report her statements? Only the already committed ever see the Independent here.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

5. Well...

she can talk in generalities but not specifics is my understanding. She talked about this to Democracy Now yesturday:

" I could have given you some specific information. I'm hoping that these authorities, being Director Mueller, during his testimony, or the report that was expected to be out by Inspector General's Office to come out, actually, instead of being sealed, and shoved under this blanket of secrecy so that you would see these specific informations, because I don't know if you are aware of it or not, but Attorney General Ashcroft on October 18, 2002, personally asserted State Secret Privilege in my case. I would read two sentences here: “To prevent disclosure of certain classified and sensitive national security information, Attorney General Ashcroft today asserted the State Secret Privilege in Sibel Edmonds' case. This assertion was made at the request of the F.B.I. Director Robert Mueller,” in papers filed today, and they are citing the reason that because this case would create substantial risks of disclosing classified and sensitive national security information that could cause serious damage to our country's security. They are citing that this privilege is very rare and is asserted to prevent certain information getting -- becoming public or hurting diplomatic relations. I would underline this phrase, diplomatic relations several times.

(...)

However, as I said, Inspector General's Office’s report was supposed to be out in October, 2002. Here we are sitting in March 2004, and my sources are telling me they are going to seal this report, and it will be never made public. Now, to protect certain diplomatic relations? -- that is the question. What diplomatic relations? To this date, I have been waiting to see this information to be available, and become available and be out there, but it's not getting there. And there's so much that the public just simply doesn't know. About what went wrong, what we had, and my last hope right now is this Commission. 9-11 Commission is my last hope because I have pursued all possible authority channels that I could have pursued. I have gone to the Senate. I have provided testimony to the Inspector General's Office and the F.B.I. They have confirmed these allegations, however, this information is being prevented from becoming public. It needs to be public because first we have to acknowledge the facts before we go about fixing these problems. If they don't want to admit to these facts and they want to -- they don't want to acknowledge it, then we have no chance of really addressing the serious issue of national security and terrorism that they are citing. "

more:
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/03/31/1616221

I'm assuming this is like our Official Secrets Act (tho not as tough) but I must admit I've never heard of it.

[Junkdrawer]

4. They built a special room for her testimony???

Mrs Edmonds, 33, says she gave her evidence to the commission in a specially constructed "secure" room within the Hart building of the US Senate. She was hired as a translator for the FBI's Washington field office on 13 September 2001, just two days after the al-Qa'ida attacks. Her job was to translate documents and recordings from FBI wire-taps, some of which had already been translated and some of which were new.


Question is, will she pull a Daniel Ellsberg ?

[loudsue]

6. We, at DU, have known this from the get-go...

WHEN WHEN WHEN are the rest of the people going to get to hear this? This country is so far gone it's scary.

:kick::kick::kick::kick::kick::kick:

[JohnyCanuck]

7. kick n/t

n/t