BERN, Switzerland, Feb. 17 (UPI) -- A dispute over alleged secret U.S. flights carrying suspected terrorists has embroiled Switzerland and Reporters Without Borders.
Reporters Without Borders has appealed to the Swiss government to abandon charges against three journalists who revealed the existence of secret CIA prisons in Kosovo, Macedonia, Ukraine, Rumania and Bulgaria.
On Jan. 8, the Swiss weekly SonntagsBlick reproduced an Egyptian Foreign Minister fax to the Egyptian London embassy alluding to CIA detention centers in Kosovo, Macedonia, Ukraine, Rumania and Bulgaria.
The SonntagsBlick coverage produced an uproar in Switzerland and Switzerland's secret services were implicated in the leak of the purloined document. Romania and Bulgaria denied all charges and the Bush administration, while admitting the existence of chartered CIA flights, steadfastly denied the existence of detention facilities.
Other sources have listed the detainee nations as up to 10.
Justice Minister Christoph Blocher and Defense Minister Samuel Schmid wrote to the federal councilors that the accused correspondents were fulfilling their professional duties on a case of public interest.
