Polish Euro MP seeks removal of name from CIA prisons report

(BRUSSELS) - Polish socialist euro MP Marek Siwiec has brought court action in Poland demanding Swiss senator Dick Marty removes his name from a report about secret CIA prisons in Europe.

Despite earlier attempts to end the dispute in a "conciliatory" fashion Marty has maintained his "untrue statements" in his report as rappoorteur for the Council of Europe on the rendition flights, Siwiec's office said in a statement from Poland.

Siwiec's attorney, Mariusz Paplaczyk, lodged the summons at a court in Poznan, Poland on Monday, demanding an apology from Marty and the removal of his name from the secret prisons report.

Marty's report said clandestine prisons in northeast Poland and southeast Romania were part of a "global spider's web" of detentions and illegal prisoner transfers spun by the United States and its allies after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Marty accused Poland and Romania of harbouring the CIA detention centres between 2003 and 2005.

He said that Siwiec, then the Polish minister of defence, along with others including former Polish president Aleksander Kwasniewski), had aproved Poland's role in the secret CIA activities and detentions.

Siwiec remains willing to "reach an agreement with the defendant... to stop the violation of the good name of the (Euro) deputy," the MEP's office said in a statement.

The European Commission has called on EU countries accused of taking part in the covert CIA program to conduct impartial investigations "as quickly as possible" to establish responsibility.