Berlin
German opposition leaders this week called for a full parliamentary inquiry into the role of German intelligence during the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Citing a U.S. military study, The New York Times reported that Germany, which publicly opposed the war, gave the U.S. a copy of Saddam Hussein’s defense plans for Baghdad and kept two spies in the city to assist the Americans during the early days of the occupation. The BND, the German equivalent of the CIA, called the allegations “plain wrong.” Still, several newspapers accused former chancellor Gerhard Schröder, who won re-election in 2002 by campaigning as a peacenik, of being “a liar and a hypocrite.”
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