Remember the story from a little while ago, about the ex-Green-Beret vigilante - Jonathan Idema - who was arrested in Kabul for
running a private prison, complete with torture chambers? The Afghan government (yes, our Afghan government) kinda took issue with the fact that he was taking hostages illegally, so they went after him.
When this originally broke, the administration was so concerned about bad publicity that a State Department spokesman stated explicitly on July 8th that these guys were not affiliated with the government.
Well, we're now hearing another side of the story - Jonathan Idema's side. As reported by Reuters today, Idema is claiming that he was working for the U.S. government after all.
"
We were working for the U.S. counter-terrorist group and working with the Pentagon and some other federal agencies," Idema told reporters before the opening of his trial.
"We were in contact directly by fax and email and phone with Donald Rumsfeld's office," he said, referring to the Secretary of Defense.
Furthermore, he claims he has proof.
"The American authorities absolutely condoned what we did, they absolutely supported what we did. We have extensive evidence to that ... We're prepared to show emails and correspondence and tape recorded conversations," he said.
Wow. Folks, this is going to be a big story.