A worldwide scoop?

This is something else again. Apparently, the forged documents beind the Niger uranium claim was given to US diplomats by a reporter for an Italian tabloid that is owned by Silvio Berlusconi, the Prime Minister of Italy.

Corriere della Sera, an Italian daily, quoted Elisabetta Burba as saying her source "in the past proved to be reliable." Burba, who writes for the weekly Panorama, refused to reveal her source.

"I realized that this could be a worldwide scoop, but that's exactly why I was very worried," Burba was quoted as saying. "If it turned out to be a hoax and I published it, I would have ended my career."

At least someone recognized the implications of using forged materials.

Corriere della Sera quoted the journalist as saying she went to Niger to try to check out the authenticity of the documents. Burba told the paper that she was suspicious because the documents spoke of such a large amount of uranium — 500 tons — and were short on details on how it would be transported and arrangements for final delivery.

On her return, she said, she told Panorama's top editor that "the story seemed fake to me."

One thing I'd like to know is if, when turning the papers over to the US diplomats, she told them that she'd checked them out and that the paper had decided that they were too unreliable to use.

Posted by thorswitch at July 20, 2003 10:11 PM | TrackBack