(25.3.2001) US intelligence services instigated and abetted rightwing terrorism in Italy during the 1970s, a former Italian secret service general has claimed.

The allegation was made by General Gianadelio Maletti, a former head of military counter-intelligence, at the trial last week of rightwing extremists accused of killing 16 people in the bombing of a Milan bank in 1969 – the first time such a charge has been made in a court of law by a senior Italian intelligence figure.