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Friday, December 16, 2011
Swiss charge 3 men in nuclear smuggling case (AP)
GENEVA ? Three Swiss engineers ? a father and his two sons ? have been charged with breaking arms export laws by aiding a Pakistani-led nuclear smuggling ring that supplied Libya's atomic weapons program, prosecutors said Tuesday. The mens' formal indictment follows almost a decade of politically-charged investigation that lifted the veil on one of the most successful international intelligence operations to stop nuclear proliferation to rogue states.
Urs Tinner, 46, his brother Marco, 43, and their father Friedrich, 74, are suspected of providing technology and know-how to the nuclear smuggling network of Abdul Qadeer Khan, the architect of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, the federal prosecutors office in Bern said in a statement.
"Based on the results of the inquiries, offenses of forgery, money laundering and pornography ? in the case of one person only ? were investigated," prosecutors said. "The criminal proceedings were further expanded to include a fourth person suspected of offenses against the War Material Act, although this person played only a subordinate role."
Prosecutors said the Tinners have agreed to request a shortened legal procedure that could ensure politically sensitive aspects of the investigation aren't discussed in court. The unidentified fourth defendant will be charged in separate legal proceedings with breaking Swiss arms exports laws, prosecutors said.
The Tinners, from eastern Switzerland, have been under investigation by Swiss authorities for almost a decade over their involvement in the Khan smuggling ring. Khan sold key equipment such as centrifuges for uranium enrichment to various countries until his operation was disrupted in 2003.
Urs Tinner, who was released on bail in December 2008 after almost five years in investigative detention, claimed in a 2009 interview with Swiss TV station SF1 that he had tipped off U.S. intelligence about a delivery of centrifuge parts meant for Libya's nuclear weapons program.
The shipment was seized at the Italian port of Taranto in 2003, forcing Libya to admit and eventually renounce its efforts to acquire nuclear weapons.
The CIA has declined to comment on the Tinner case. But the agency has said in the past that "the disruption of the A.Q. Khan network was a genuine intelligence success, one in which the CIA played a key role."
A book by U.S. investigative reporters Douglas Frantz and Catherine Collins, titled "The Nuclear Jihadist" and based on interviews with sources in the U.S. intelligence community, backs Urs Tinner's claim that he was recruited by the CIA as early as 2000.
Swiss prosecutors said in their statement Tuesday that the question of the Tinners' cooperation with the CIA remained unresolved, because the Swiss government denied a request to open a criminal investigation into the issue.
In 2007, the Swiss government ordered evidence in the case destroyed, citing national security concerns. The decision prompted outrage in Switzerland and accusations the government had acted under pressure from Washington.
Prosecutors said they were able to recover copies of some of the files, but others ? including all electronic records ? have been "definitively lost."
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Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Nikita Scoop: "Naked" Sean Pierce, Broken Fingers and a Clean Sweep (omg!)
Nikita's midseaon finale left viewers with more than a few questions, and star Maggie Q sat down with reporters this month to tease what to expect once the show returns in January.
Want some almost-nudity? Nikita new guy Dillon Casey, who plays Oversight's Sean Pierce, will be stripping down all in the name of the upcoming power play. "He's naked in the whole episode,? the one that we just finished [shooting]," said Q. "There were a couple women on set who ... [placed] bets on how his body was underneath because he would wear suits all the time. Anyway, he strips down completely to his underwear for the whole episode. He gets tied to a chair with no clothes on. His body is amazing."
From Nikita to Chuck: TV's sexiest crime fighters
Tied to a chair? That sounds like an Amanda (Melinda Clarke) interrogation special to us! Check out what else is coming up for Nikita next year:
Rogue family reunion. Alex (Lyndsy Fonseca) and Nikita won't always be at odds. "Alex is going to find out more about her family, which is going to move her in that direction again," said Q. "You are going to see them work together again. It's going to be lovely. There's such an older-sister-younger-sister dynamic that goes on. It's nice, and you're going to see some nice, tender moments with them too... and then you'll see them split apart again."
Tomcat fight! Guardian Patrick Miller (William DeVry) is on the loose after Michael (Shane West) saved him and Nikita, but that's not the last we'll see of him. "We have some action stuff together that's really, really fun," said Q. "And apparently Devon [Sawa], Shane and him have a big fight that's coming up. Because it's hot. Every time the guys fight it's hot."
Nikita lite. Fans of the show may have noticed that their favorite rogue agent hasn't been going mano a mano as much lately. That's because Q broke two of her fingers on set when a heavy grate fell on her hands. "We've been trying to go around the action right now with me for about three episodes because I've been healing," she said. "I just took my splints off last week so you can see my hands... We had to write it in to the episode you saw with Birkhoff. This SEAL is chasing me, and I grab this basketball to hit the cop with. I played the moment like, 'Ow!' So there's a Navy SEAL but somehow I hurt my hand on a basketball? It was all we could do because we had shot the rest of the stuff already."
Nikita's Maggie Q offers hope for "Mikita" fans
Amorous Amanda? We're still quaking from Amanda's interrogation of Birkhoff (Aaron Stanford), but apparently there's a softer side to her. "I think there's going to be some allusion to something between her and Percy," Q teased.
An Oversight affair to remember. Nikita will have a long-awaited run-in with Oversight's Madeline Pierce (La Femme Nikita's Albert Watson)."It's coming up. It's going to be cool because Nikita hates her," said Q.
Roan... revealed. The Division cleaner (Rob Stewart) has had much more screen time this season, and there's a reason for it. "Roan is absolutely involved with everything that's going on right now," said Q. "That will be revealed soon, how he's tangled up in this whole thing with Oversight." If we were Roan, we'd be after Nikita for that facial acid-scarring.
Percy's master plan. Percy (Xander Berkeley) might be in that glaringly lit Division jail, but he's as dangerous as ever. "Percy is not stupid. He's not locked up in there doing nothing," said Q. "There's a lot of underhandedness... and we have some scenes coming up, which is really exciting. There are going to be a series of three episodes [Episodes 11-13] that run as a one big story line where everything seems to be converging and the impending implosion will happen. It's basically the web of Nikita, Division, Oversight, Percy, Alex -- everything kind of coming together and how tangled it's become and what's been bubbling under the surface that's going to happen."
A new beginning. "Episode 13 is called 'Clean Sweep.' So 14 is a rebirth of everything that just exploded. Where they're going to go, we don't know."
A finale fatality. What's a Nikita finale without a shocking death? "By the end of the season, yes, absolutely," said Q. "Honestly, by the end of the second season, you're going to be like, 'What?!?' Again."
Nikita returns with original episodes on Friday, Jan. 6 at 8/7c on The CW.
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