More slow-lane investigations?
This from the Wall Street Journal …
As Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Chalabi arrives this week in Washington for talks, there is little sign of progress in a federal investigation of allegations that he once leaked U.S. intelligence secrets to Iran.
More than 17 months after then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice publicly promised a full criminal inquiry, the Federal Bureau of Investigation hasn’t interviewed Mr. Chalabi himself or many current and former U.S. government officials thought likely to have information related to the matter, according to lawyers for several of these individuals and others close to the case.
The investigation of Mr. Chalabi, who had been a confidant of senior Defense Department officials before the war in Iraq, remains in the hands of the FBI, with little active interest from local federal prosecutors or the Justice Department, these people said. There also has been no grand-jury involvement in the case.
It’s been suggested that the accusations that Chalabi leaked US secrets to the Iranians were no more than a bureaucratic power-play against him by his opponents in the US government. The fact that he and his supporters have used this excuse to explain various other bad acts of which he was certainly guilty does not inspire a lot of confidence. But on this issue of his ties with Iran I don’t know much more than what I read in the papers. So anything is possible.
But even that wouldn’t seem a good reason to have yet another phantom FBI investigation in which no attempt has been made to speak to principals in the case.
