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MILAN — An Italian judge on Wednesday suspended a kidnapping trial linked to the CIA's extraordinary rendition program after the government said testimony could be a threat to Italy's national security.
The Milan trial involves 26 Americans and five Italian intelligence agents charged in the 2003 kidnapping of an Egyptian cleric. Most of the Americans are CIA agents.
It is the first trial to involve the CIA's program of secretly transferring terrorism suspects to third countries where, critics of the program contend, they risked torture.
Judge Oscar Magi suspended the trial until March 18 in the expectation that Italy's Constitutional Court would have resolved the national security issue by then. A ruling from the high court is due March 10.
Both Premier Silvio Berlusconi and his predecessor Romano Prodi have warned that testimony in the case could compromise operations between Italian spy services and the CIA.
Prosecutor Armando Spataro argued that the use of state secrecy was "blocking justice and the verification of the truth."
None of the CIA agents have appeared in court. From the outset, the CIA has declined to comment on the case.
The defendants are charged with abducting cleric and terror suspect Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, also known as Abu Omar, from a Milan street on Feb. 17, 2003 and flying him to Egypt, where he claimed he was tortured in Egyptian custody.
