[COLUMN] CIA convictions a victory for rule of law

Italian Judge Oscar Magi, seen at the Milan court, Italy, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2009.  (AP Photo/Luca Bruno) 

Judge Oscar Magi, of Milan, Italy, on Wednesday found him guilty and sentenced him to eight years in prison. He also handed five-year sentences to 22 other Americans who, along with Lady, were involved in the Feb. 17, 2003, kidnapping of Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, a Muslim cleric.

Lady is the former CIA base chief in Milan. Of the other convicted Americans, 21 were CIA operatives and one was an Air Force colonel. They were tried in absentia.

They were operating under the (un-)American practice of rendition, in which terrorism suspects are captured in one country and taken for questioning in another, often one more open to coercive interrogation techniques, i.e., torture.

The cleric, better known as Abu Omar, was, according to Italian prosecutors, kidnapped in broad daylight, flown from an American air base in Italy to a base in Germany and then on to Egypt, where he was tortured.

The court victory was the first conviction of American CIA operatives operating under the controversial rendition program. More are likely to follow in other countries.

Though the Americans were sentenced to prison, it is unlikely any of them will ever spend a day behind bars, which is unfortunate. Even if the prosecutors were able to secure an international arrest warrant, the convicted spies would only be subject to arrest if they traveled outside the United States.

Nasr, wasn't afforded such protection. Though he has never been convicted of a crime, these CIA operatives kidnapped him and took somewhere to be tortured.

It is unfathomable that anyone could possibly think it is good policy for the United States to kidnap people on the streets of foreign countries for the purpose of torture.

Lady, whose whereabouts are unknown, admitted as much in an interview earlier this year with Il Giornale, a newspaper owned by the brother of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

"Of course it was an illegal operation," Lady said. "But that's our job. We're at war against terrorism."

However, that is no excuse for lawless behavior. That is especially true on the streets of a nation with whom we are not at war.

All must agree that Italy has the right to pass laws against kidnapping and that these CIA officers, with or without the assistance of Italian authorities, broke Italian law.

No one is above the law, including the CIA.

Some would argue that the CIA officers were simply doing their duty.

Hogwash.

Such an excuse is no defense for ignoring the legitimate laws of a foreign nation.

The problem here is that such tactics are wholly counter to the American ethos. The American government, when it conducts such practices as extraordinary rendition, is behaving as a rogue government. It is acting no better than the terrorists it purports to be fighting.

The idea that they were simply following orders is a defense that was repudiated during the trials of Nazis after World War II.

Nasr was under surveillance by Italian authorities. If there were enough evidence to arrest him on suspicion of terrorism, the American authorities should have gone through the proper legal channels to arrest him. There was no imminent danger. Lives were not at stake. The Americans were simply looking for another Muslim cleric to torture in hopes of gaining some intelligence on terrorist activities.

Nasr was held for a year before he was released in Egypt.

The sad thing about the rendition program is that President Barack Obama has refused to discontinue the practice. While he has closed, supposedly, the CIA's secret prisons (another un-American abomination), he continues to support the idea that the American government can kidnap anyone it wishes anywhere in the world.

This is odd.

For a man who campaigned against most of President George W. Bush's tactics in fighting terrorism, he has yet to change anything other than closing the secret prisons.

So much for change.

It is time the American government stopped ignoring the sovereignty of the rest of the world and begin living within the rule of law.

These convictions show we are not setting the example we should as a powerful self-governing free nation.