CIA's Wye role faces scrutiny inside the US

White House Press Spokesman Joe Lockhart said yesterday that the US Central Intelligence Agency is not playing an unprecedented role in the Palestinian - Israeli security agreement, despite questions from the US legislature.

The US Senate intelligence committee will hold hearings on the CIA's role in the Wye agreement, which State Department Spokesman James Rubin described as "facilitating the professionals from the Israeli and the Palestinian side to combat terrorism, which is a very important foreign policy objective of the United States" and providing facts in monitoring the agreement.

Lockhart noted that the CIA has been involved in the Middle East as long ago as 1973 and that it played a role in the 1979 Camp David accords.

"There was some talk over the weekend that this was an unprecedented role for the CIA, and I think we'd dispute that. However, we do look forward to any member of Congress who wants to talk about this. We look forward to hearings they will hold and to testifying, laying out our point of view," Lockhart said.

CIA chief George Tenet was involved in the Wye Plantation peace talks last week.