World in brief: Saudi prince linked to BAE scandal

Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the powerful former U.S. ambassador who has been one of the Bush administration’s strongest allies in the Middle East, was publicly linked to a widening British corruption scandal Thursday with reports that a British aerospace company secretly paid up to $2 billion into bank accounts at the Saudi embassy in Washington.

The new allegations point directly at Bandar, son of the Saudi crown prince and a man who has been a key ally for both the current President Bush and his father as well as a frequent contact of Vice President Dick Cheney’s.

According to reports by the BBC and London’s Guardian newspaper, documents show that BAE Systems made cash transfers to Bandar every three months for 10 years or more, drawn from a confidential account at the Bank of England to which British government departments had access.

The payments are alleged to have grown out of a 20-year-long, $86 billion oil-for-arms deal under which Britain supplied Saudi Arabia with 120 Tornado aircraft, Hawk warplanes and other military equipment.

Paris

Report: CIA got help with prisons

A European investigator said he has “factually established” that Poland and Romania allowed the CIA to operate secret prisons where alleged al-Qaida operatives were detained and interrogated, according to documents scheduled to be presented today to Europe’s official human rights organization.

Dick Marty, a Swiss lawyer for the Council of Europe, the continent’s human rights agency, said detainees who were considered “especially sensitive” were incarcerated in Poland and those believed “to be less important were held in Romania,” the documents said.

The documents, which were obtained by the Washington Post, include the cover letter and explanatory note of a report Marty has drafted, as well as a related draft resolution to be proposed to the council. Those documents did not provide details of the evidence Marty used to verify the participation of Poland and Romania in the covert CIA program.

Those two countries have repeatedly denied hosting CIA prisons.

Seoul, South Korea

N. Korea launches two missiles

North Korea two fired short-range missiles into its coastal waters Thursday, apparently as part of regular military drills, South Korean military officials said amid a stalemate in international talks on the communist country’s nuclear weapons.

The missiles, fired into the waters off the North’s western coast, were believed to have a range of around 62 miles, an official at South Korea’s Defense Ministry said today.

The missiles, however, demonstrated no new threat from the North, and were unlikely to ratchet up regional tension. The country’s arsenal includes a variety of missiles, some of which are believed able to reach parts of the United States.