WASHINGTON, July 11: The White House faced fierce questioning on Monday over top political aide Karl Rove’s involvement in a CIA leak scandal and Democratic calls mounted for President George Bush to sideline the adviser. One Democratic lawmaker said the intentional disclosure of a covert agent’s identity amounted to an ‘act of treason’. Others urged Mr Bush to sideline Karl Rove by suspending his access to classified information and said the aide should ‘clear the air’ by answering questions from Congress.

After publicly defending Mr Rove two years ago, the White House responded to a barrage of pointed questions on Monday by saying that it would not comment at the request of the prosecutors investigating who leaked the identify of the CIA agent, Valerie Plame.

Newsweek magazine reported on Sunday that Mr Rove was one of the secret sources who spoke to Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper about Ms Plame and her husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson. The Washington Post on Monday quoted Mr Rove’s lawyer as saying that his client did not mention Ms Plame by name.

Ms Plame’s name was leaked, her diplomat husband said, because of his criticism of the Bush administration’s handling of the Iraq war.—Reuters