MADRID, Nov 16: Concern widened on Wednesday in a clutch of countries in Europe and north Africa over the use of their airports by US intelligence officials to transfer suspected Muslim extremists.

Germany, Hungary, Italy, Morocco, Norway, Poland, Romania, Spain and Sweden have all been linked to the CIA’s use of planes for the transit, or rendition, of prisoners allegedly subjected to extra-judicial detention and torture.

In Oslo, the Norwegian government summoned a US embassy official over the landing in Oslo on July 20 of a plane which, according to media reports, was one of those the CIA used to transport the suspected extremists.

According to a foreign ministry spokesman, the official ‘denied that the plane in question had been used by the American authorities at the time’.

The Swedish government similarly demanded ‘complete information’ from its civil aviation authorities after the TT news agency reported at least two suspected CIA planes had landed at Swedish airports over the past three years and that one of them was used at the US base at Guantanamo Bay on Cuba, probably for transporting prisoners.

In Morocco, Le Journal weekly on Saturday cited a former agent with the national DST intelligence service as saying the country had directly participated in the CIA operation with at least ten flights carrying prisoners landing in Morocco between Dec 2002 and February this year.

In Spain, El Pais cited a report by the civil guard, which has military as well as police functions, as saying the prisoner transport planes made at least 10 secret stopoffs at Palma de Mallorca, in the Balearic Islands, between Jan 22 of last year and Jan 17 of this year. The Canary Islands might also be concerned by the affair.

That news prompted Interior Minister Jose Antonio Alonso to say on Tuesday that if the reports were true, it could damage relations between Madrid and Washington as such flights would be ‘intolerable in every sense’.

Spain’s United Left opposition party has demanded that Alonso appear before parliament to explain the situation along with Alberto Saiz, head of national intelligence bureau CNI.

“I’m not aware that we’ve been officially approached by the government of Spain,” US State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said on Tuesday when asked about the controversy.

The US Senate has asked the CIA to inform it as to the precise nature of its prisoner transport operations.

According to the Washington Post, the CIA has placed more than 100 illegally held suspects in a secret prison network in Afghanistan, Thailand and Eastern Europe since the 9/11 attacks.—AFP