12 Jul 2009

Cheney 'silenced CIA over spy plan'

Dick Cheney, the former US vice-president, deliberately withheld details of a secret CIA spy programme from the US congress for eight years, a newspaper has reported.

Cheney

Cheney, who was vice-president to George Bush between 2001 and January this year, ordered the CIA not to tell congress of a new "counter-terrorism" programme, The New York Times reported on Saturday.

The details of the intelligence programme, launched after the attacks on the US in September 2001, remain secret.

According to the Time's sources, Cheney's role in stifling the information was revealed by Leon Panetta, who now heads the CIA and who ordered the programme to be stopped in June.

Al Jazeera