Doc. 11302 Report 208. A noteworthy aspect of this partnership was that everything was carried out under the NATO framework. The deployment at MK Airfield in February 2003 was authorised in a Memorandum of Understanding signed by President Ion Iliescu in late 2002, in which the terms of NATO SOFA and the bilateral “SOFA Supplemental” were expressly referenced. “NATO concepts” were applied to the deployment, including MK’s designation as an APOD/APOE,187and the phase being referred to as “regrouping”. Most important of all, a Joint Operations Centre was established in which American and Romanian personnel “from each and every branch” of their respective armed forces and services worked together side-by-side throughout the operation, sharing operational knowledge in strict accordance with the NATO Security Policy. 209. Members of the Directorate for Military Intelligence, the “J2” unit, participated in the Joint Operations Centre,188which – as our American sources confirmed – also received “visits”189from operatives of the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Center (CTC) between February and June 2003. While the whole four-month period of Operation Iraqi Freedom at MK Airfield was characterised as “a military activity in support of a military operation”, the relationships formed and strengthened between members of the respective intelligence services – both individually and collectively – were just as indispensable in the broader context of the “war on terror”.190The operation was construed as a welcome “dry-run” for Romania in NATO and for potential future bilateral actions between the partners. 210. Continuity in the evolving relationship between American and Romanian services can perhaps best be illustrated by highlighting the role of the then Head of the Directorate of Military Intelligence and Representation (Sef al Directiei de Informatii si Reprezentare Militara), Sergiu Tudor Medar. GeneralLieutenant Medar served in the United States for seven years in the 1990s, heading the Office of the Romanian Defense Attaché in Washington DC until 1999. Between 2000 and 2003 he headed the original incarnation of the Directorate of Military Intelligence in the DGIA; then from 2003 until the end of 2005 he was head of the restructured “J2” unit. General-Lieutenant Medar was a prescient choice for the CIA as a liaison for secret detention operations in Romania: not only was he trusted beyond doubt in both the United States and NATO military circles; he was also, as the following quote attests, aware of the potential perils of partnering with military intelligence to achieve an essentially political goal: “The civilian leadership’s tendency in using its control over intelligence for political purposes is likely to be even bigger than its desire to keep the military component under its firm control. Some equilibrium must be established between the professional experience of the Military Intelligence Service and the authority of the civilian political leadership.”191 186. At the time of Operation Iraqi Freedom, and up until 27 April 2004, MK stood on its own as the 57th Air Force Base of the Romanian Air Force. From 1 May 2004, the self-standing air force base at MK was “disbanded” and Romanian military air traffic reduced significantly, as part of wider restructuring in the Ministry of National Defence. The MK Airfield is therefore now administered from Fetesti as an extension of the 86th Air Force Base; the only active unit located at MK is the 863 Helicopter Squadron. 187. APOD stands for Aerial Port of Debarkation; APOE stands for Aerial Port of Embarkation. Under NATO concepts these references mean that MK Airfield was hosting primarily transport aircraft that were bringing in and shipping out personnel and equipment. 188. Confirmed in interviews by the rapporteur’s representative with Romanian military personnel stationed at MK Airfield. Military intelligence was the second of nine categories of military staff that participated in the Joint Operations Centre. The other categories were: personnel, operations, logistics, planning, communications, training, finance and budget, and “cimic” – or civil-military co-operation. 189. Visits by United States officials to Romanian facilities in the context of their classified bilateral arrangements are regulated under the NATO framework and the “Agreement on the protection of military classified information” of 21 June 1995 (entered into force in 2003). See “Answers of the Romanian delegation to the questionnaire on the alleged secret detention centres”, appended to the letter to me from Gyorgy Frunda, chairperson of the Romanian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly, 20 January 2006; at p. 1. Article 5.1 of the 1995 Agreement states as follows: “The authorisation for ‘visits’ by one party to units or installations of the other party where access to state classified military information is necessary, will be limited to official purposes … [and] to government officials both parties have agreed upon.” 190. One example of how Romanian military intelligence continued to collaborate with the United States in the “war on terror” was parliament’s endorsement in March 2004 of President Iliescu’s proposals to send a special military intelligence detachment of 30 officers to serve in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. See Rompres News Agency, Bucharest, “Parliament approves Romanian military intelligence unit for Afghanistan”, reproduced on BBC Monitoring, 2 March 2004, available at http://www.roembus.org/english/news/ international_media/2004/march/02/ BBC_Monitoring_20_03_2004 Parliament%20approves%20Romanian%20military%20intelligence% 20unit%20for %20Afghanistan.htm. 191. See Sergiu Medar, “The role of military intelligence in the process of military and political-military decision making” (original in Romanian), internal document of the Directorate for Military Intelligence, Bucharest, 2000; cited in Florin Ureche, “Civilian Control over Military Intelligence Services”, in Romanian Military Thinking, April 2006, pp. 63-74, copy on file with the rapporteur. 45