Ex-CIA fugitive arrested in Panama

Former CIA Milan station chief Robert Seldon Lady, convicted in Italy of kidnapping an Egyptian Muslim cleric, has been arrested in Panama, Italian judicial sources have told Reuters.

Italy's highest court last year upheld a guilty verdict against Seldon Lady for the kidnapping of Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, who was snatched from a Milan street in 2003 and flown to Egypt for interrogation, where he says he was tortured for seven months.

The imam, also known as Abu Omar, was a resident in Italy at the time of the abduction.

Seldon Lady was given a nine-year prison sentence and another 22 Americans seven-year sentences in absentia for the abduction of the imam.

The Italian trial was the first of its kind against the “rendition” flights practiced by the administration of former US president George W. Bush, which have been condemned by human rights groups.

Reuters