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Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Petraeus' Successor John Allen In Email Probe

Petraeus' Successor John Allen In Email Probe
Petraeus Successor 


America's top commander in Afghanistan is under investigation for alleged "inappropriate communications" with a woman, in the latest twist to the scandal surrounding the CIA's ex-director.

General David Petraeus resigned as CIA chief last week over his extramarital affair with Paula Broadwell, his biographer. Now the Pentagon has acknowledged that General John Allen had been in communication with Jill Kelley, who is said to have received threatening emails from Ms Broadwell. Gen Allen succeeded Gen Petraeus as the top American commander in Afghanistan in July 2011.


The FBI referred the matter involving Gen Allen to the Pentagon on Sunday, and a Pentagon investigation into his conduct was ordered on Monday. Ms Kelley has been described as an unpaid social liaison at MacDill Air Force Base, Florida, which is headquarters to the US Central Command. She is not a US government employee. Meanwhile, the CIA has dismissed as "baseless" claims by Ms Broadwell that Libyan militants were held in covert prisons before a deadly attack on the Benghazi US consulate on September 11.

She alleged in a speech that the attack on the base, in which US ambassador Christopher Stevens was killed, was part of an attempt to free prisoners. She also claimed that Gen Petraeus knew of the hidden cells - even though Barack Obama took away the CIA’s power to take prisoners soon after he was inaugurated in January 2009. Her comments were recorded on video and put on YouTube, but the clip has since been taken down. A spokesman for the CIA said: "Any suggestion that the agency is still in the detention business is uninformed and baseless."

The nature of the alleged communications between Gen Allen and Ms Kelley has not been disclosed. An official said they ran to as many as 30,000 pages of emails and other documents dated from 2010 to 2012. "General Allen disputes that he has engaged in any wrongdoing in this matter," the unnamed official told the AP news agency. Gen Allen remains in his post as commander of the International Security Assistance Force, based in Kabul. It is thought the FBI's decision to refer the matter to the Pentagon, rather than deal with it itself, along with the move to let Gen Allen continue in his job without suspension, mean his alleged actions may be viewed as breaking military rules rather than any criminal laws.

Source: Yahoo News 

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