Doc. 11302 Report 110. In addition to its own rules, NATO insists that strict regimes protecting classified information exist on a national level. The Membership Action Plan of 1999 implored the NATO “aspirants” – specifically, nine countries in central and eastern Europe – to introduce “sufficient safeguards and procedures to ensure the security of the most sensitive information as laid down in the NATO security policy”.75Indeed commentators have rightly raised concern around the stringent rules on state secrecy that several countries have introduced as part of their accession to NATO76and, particularly, “whether NATO’s requirements are unduly biased against transparency… [and] tilted toward secrecy to an unwarranted degree”.77It seems natural that such a security-of-information regime suited the purposes of the CIA. 111. Finally, with regard to the particular scope of my inquiry, it is apt to point out that NATO allies and partners have also developed various forms of co-operation in the realms of air defence and air traffic management.78Inevitably these initiatives have developed new dimensions and complexities in the worlds of civil and military aviation, some of which may not yet be properly regulated and may permit unlawful clandestine operations using aircraft to pass “under the radar”. In the course of analysing my database of aircraft movements, I have also noted that NATO has established a co-operation with Eurocontrol, which aims at “developing civil-military air traffic procedures in the light of the new security environment”.79 3.2. Bilateral arrangements 3.2.1. Securing agreements with certain countries to host “black sites” for HVDs 112. Despite the importance of the multilateral NATO framework in creating the broad authorisation for United States counter-terrorism operations, it is important to emphasise that the key arrangements for CIA clandestine operations in Europe were secured on a bilateral level. 113. According to American sources, such bilateral arrangements (referred to simply as “bilaterals”) exist under many different forms in Europe alone. For example, at the lower end of the range, bilaterals can institute ad hoc collaboration on a single operation to capture, detain or transfer a particular target. The welldocumented cases of Abu Omar’s abduction in Milan80 and Khaled El-Masri’s 23-day ordeal in a hotel in Skopje before being handed over to a rendition team81are instances in which the CIA worked with partner intelligence services in Italy82and “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”,83respectively, in this manner. 114. In the middle of this range, bilateral agreements signed pursuant to the multilateral NATO framework, and in conformity with NATO standards, have often encompassed elements of intelligence co-operation. Alternatively they have granted “civilian” components – a phrase often used loosely for those operating on behalf of the CIA – the same privileges and permissions that would normally be reserved for members of the military forces. Romania’s “SOFA Supplemental” agreement with the United States on 31 October 2001, analysed later in this section, appears to be a good example of such a middle-range “bilateral”. It also demonstrates the potential for partnership and co-operation to intensify over a period of several years. 75. See NATO, “Membership Action Plan”, Press Release NAC-S(99) 66, Brussels, 24 April 1999. 76. For insight into the NATO secrecy and security-of-information regime and its negative impact on transparency in general, I have drawn from the work of the Canadian specialist on transparency issues, Professor Alasdair Roberts, who is based at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University in the United States. For specific articles, refer to Professor Roberts’ website at www.aroberts.us/research.html. 77. See Alasdair Roberts, “NATO, Secrecy and the Right to Information”, East European Constitutional Review, (Fall/Winter 2003) 86, at p. 87. 78. See NATO Partnership Action Plan against Terrorism, 22 November 2002, available at http://www.nato.int/docu/ basictxt/b021122e.htm; at paragraph 16.2.3. 79. See Report on the Partnership Action Plan against Terrorism, 23 June 2004, available at http://www.nato.int/docu/ basictxt/b040623be.htm; at paragraph 7.4. 80. For a detailed account of the abduction of the Egyptian citizen Hassan Osama Mustafa Nasr (known as Abu Omar) in Milan, see the Marty report 2006, supra note 6, at p. 37, paragraph 162. For an analysis of this case based on extensive contact with insider sources in the CIA, see the recent article by Matthew Cole, “Blowback”, GQ Magazine, March 2007, available at http://www.matthewacole.com/pdfs/Blowback-GQ.pdf. 81. For a detailed account of the ordeal experienced by the German citizen Khaled El-Masri in Macedonia and Afghanistan, see the Marty report 2006, supra note 6, at pp. 25-32, paragraphs 93-132. For new details of this case, refer to Section VI.i in the present report entitled “A case study of Khaled El-Masri”. 82. Reference to the particular service involved – SISMI – based on material from the prosecution case documents compiled by Armando Spataro. 83. In “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”, as I described last year, the partner service with which the CIA collaborated to detain and transfer Khaled El-Masri was the UBK – Uprava za Bezbednosti i Kontrarazuznavanje, or the Security and Counter-Intelligence Service. See the Marty report 2006, supra note 6, in particular at pp. 29 to 30, paragraphs 116-119. 24