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Report: Missing cleric was a CIA informant

CHICAGO - A radical Egyptian cleric allegedly kidnapped from Italy by the CIA once provided the U.S. spy agency with valuable information about Islamic militants in Albania, according to a published report.

The Chicago Tribune , citing the former second-ranking official of the Albanian intelligence service, reported in today's editions that Moustafa Hassan Nasr, also known as Abu Omar, was a valuable source of information in the mid 1990s to the CIA about the close-knit community of Islamic fundamentalists living in exile in Albania, a formerly communist country in the Balkans.

Astrit Nasufi, the former Albanian intelligence officer, told the newspaper the imam had been considered a credible source of information.

Last month, an Italian judge ordered the arrests of 13 CIA officers on allegations they secretly transported the imam to Egypt from Italy as part of U.S. antiterrorism efforts - a rare public admonition by a close American ally. The warrant alleged the cleric was sent to Egypt and tortured.

Italian officials have said they had no prior knowledge of the Feb. 17, 2003, kidnapping.

The CIA has declined to comment on the case.

ORANJESTAD, Aruba - Holland will send three F-16 warplanes rigged with search equipment to find Natalee Holloway, Aruban authorities said Saturday. The Alabama 18-year-old has been missing nearly five weeks.

The three planes, equipped with infrared and sonar-scanning capacity, were expected to arrive today, said Aruban government spokesman Ruben Trapenberg.

Trapenberg said the planes were being sent after Aruban Justice Minister Rudy Croes requested more help from Holland, the Dutch Caribbean island's former colonizer.

JERUSALEM - In a groundbreaking cooperative venture, Israeli and Arab TV stations on Saturday simultaneously broadcast the first part of a documentary exploring possible solutions to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

The program's producer, Search for Common Ground, a conflict-resolution foundation, hopes that by presenting the dispute in graphic human terms and focusing on the need for territorial compromise by both sides, then the series could have a greater impact than previous documentaries, which centered on the conflict's history.

The first two parts of the four-part series, titled The Shape of the Future , were aired in Hebrew and Arabic.

MOSCOW - An Islamic group connected to Chechnya's separatists posted an Internet message on Saturday claiming responsibility for a bomb that killed at least 10 Russian special forces troops in Dagestan on Friday afternoon.

The group, the Islamic Jamaat of Dagestan Shariat, also known as Shariah Jamaat, vowed to conduct more attacks.

The blast wounded 14 other soldiers and 13 civilians, a spokesman for Dagestan's Interior Ministry said. It was the most lethal attack against Russian troops this year, and it continued the spread of the Chechen war into neighboring Russian republics.

GAY MARRIAGE IN SPAIN: The law legalizing gay marriage in Spain has cleared its last bureaucratic formality - being published in an official government registry - and will take effect today. Pedro Zerolo, an official of the ruling Socialist party that sponsored the law, said it will seek legislation to protect Spain's estimated 8,000 transsexuals.