University Daily Kansan / Wednesday, December 7, 1988
5
Iran-contra prosecutors say some covert activity was legal
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Iran-contra prosecutors sought yesterday to deny Oliver L. North's ability to disclose government secret-trail trial documents from the United States financed by Iranian arms sales were lethal.
The concessions were made in memoranda filed at the request of U.S. District Judge Gerhard A. Gesell, who is conducting closed hearings on the use of classified documents at a public trial. Declassified versions of the case were sealed later yesterday in U.S. District Court.
approved a variety of expenditures from the secret fund that was amassed from the sale of U.S. weapons to Iran.
Independent counsel Lawrence E. Walsah said he would not offer proof that North
The prosecutor said he wouldn't offer evidence about payments to Drug Enforcement Administration agents to help free U.S. hostages in Lebanon. Nor would there be proof that North approved $200,000 in payments to Nicaragua rebel leaders, the spending of $320,000 to buy a Danish ship used for a variety of clandestine operations and $100,000 to buy radios for a foreign political group not specified in the indictment.
expenditures went to programs otherwise lawful, but not within the Iran finding" in which President Reagan approved the arms embargo on Iran and included elements of Iran and free U.S. hostages.
"The government will concede for the purposes of this trial that none of the expenditures went to programs which were themselves illegal, except those for the support of the military and paramilitary activities of the contra," Walsh said.
Walsh said he was "willing to concede, for the purposes of this case, that this group of
As a result of these concessions, "the government maintains that the use of classified documents to demonstrate the bona fide of the programs supported by certain of the
proceeds of the Iranian arms sales is unjustified in light of the government's theory of the case." Walsh said.
The concessions were made after Reagan stated last week that his administration would not allow public disclosure of virtually any of the secret material that North wants to use to defend the charge he conspired to defraud the government.
White House refusal to release 40,000 pages of documents sought by North and sensitive material censored from 395 documents Walsh planned to use as prosecution exhibits threatens to scuttle the central charges against the former National Security Council
aide.
The indictment charges that North and arms dealers Albert Hakim and retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Richard V. Seybold sold U.S. arms to Iran at an inflated price to create profits, from which more than $14 million was diverted to the Nicaraguan rebels. Also indicted is former national security adviser John M. Poindexter.
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Gesen is holding secret hearings on North's requests to disclose certain classified information at the trial. The Classified Information Procedures Act provides for dismissal of charges if the government refuses to release documents that are needed for a fair trial.
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