www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/15/AR2005111501857.html?nav=rss_politics/administration
Libby's Role Woodward Was Told of Plame More Than Two Years Ago By Jim VandeHei and Carol D Leonnig Washington Post Staff Writers Wednesday, November 16, 2005; Page A01 Washington Post Assistant Managing Editor Bob Woodward testified under oa th Monday in the CIA leak case that a senior administration official tol d him about CIA operative Valerie Plame and her position at the agency n early a month before her identity was disclosed.
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Find stories, video, discussion transcripts and associated features relat ed to the investigation of the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's ide ntity to the press.
Key Players in the CIA Leak Case Analysis and short biographies of the main individuals involved in the investigation of the leak of Valerie Plame's identity to the press.
Career Highlights of I Lewis "Scooter" Libby I Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, is at the center of an investigation into the leaking of CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity.
The Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982 Fitzgerald interviewed Woodward about the previously undisclosed conversa tion after the official alerted the prosecutor to it on Nov. Citing a confidentiality agreement in which the source freed Woodward to testify but would not allow him to discuss their conversations publicly, Woodward and Post editors refused to disclose the official's name or pr ovide crucial details about the testimony. Woodward did not share the in formation with Washington Post Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr. until last month, and the only Post reporter whom Woodward said he remembers telling in the summer of 2003 does not recall the conversation taking pl ace. Woodward said he also testified that he met with Libby on June 27, 2003, and discussed Iraq policy as part of his research for a book on Presiden t Bush's march to war. He said he does not believe Libby said anything a bout Plame. He also told Fitzgerald that it is possible he asked Libby about Plame or her husband, former ambassador Joseph C Wilson IV. He based that testi mony on an 18-page list of questions he planned to ask Libby in an inter view that included the phrases "yellowcake" and "Joe Wilson's wife." Woo dward said in his statement, however, that "I had no recollection" of me ntioning the pair to Libby. He also said that his original government so urce did not mention Plame by name, referring to her only as "Wilson's w ife." Woodward's testimony appears to change key elements in the chronology Fit zgerald laid out in his investigation and announced when indicting Libby three weeks ago. It would make the unnamed official -- not Libby -- the first government employee to disclose Plame's CIA employment to a repor ter. It would also make Woodward, who has been publicly critical of the investigation, the first reporter known to have learned about Plame from a government source. The testimony, however, does not appear to shed new light on whether Libb y is guilty of lying and obstructing justice in the nearly two-year-old probe or provide new insight into the role of senior Bush adviser Karl R ove, who remains under investigation. Mark Corallo, a spokesman for Rove, said that Rove is not the unnamed off icial who told Woodward about Plame and that he did not discuss Plame wi th Woodward. Libby has said he learned Plame's identity from NBC's Tim Russert. "If what Woodward says is so, will Mr Fitzgerald now say he was wrong to say on TV that Scooter Libby was the first official to give this inform ation to a reporter?" "The second question I w ould have is: Why did Mr Fitzgerald indict Mr Libby before fully inves tigating what other reporters knew about Wilson's wife?" Fitzgerald has spent nearly two years investigating whether senior Bush a dministration officials illegally leaked classified information -- Plame 's identity as a CIA operative -- to reporters to discredit allegations made by Wilson. Plame's name was revealed in a July 14, 2003, column by Robert D Novak, eight days after Wilson publicly accused the administra tion of twisting intelligence to justify the Iraq war. Fitzgerald's spok esman, Randall Samborn, declined to comment yesterday.
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