Knight-Ridder reporters Warren P. Strobel and John Walcott report in an article published in the Contra Costa Times titled, “U.S. probes Chalabi’s ties to Iran” that U.S. Government officials allege that evidence suggests that Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmad Chalabi’s security chief, Arras Habib, is an Iranian spy who passed highly sensitive U.S. secrets to Iran’s intelligence service, the Ministry of Intelligence and Security, also known by the Persian (Farsi) acronym, VEVAK. The article cites Francis Brooke, a former subcontractor on a CIA program in northern Iraq, as stating that Habib had passed a counterintelligence-scope polygraph screening examination. Excerpt:
To qualify [for a Defense Intelligence Agency funded intelligence gathering program], Habib and other Iraqi National Congress figures were required to take polygraph tests that focused almost entirely on his connections with foreign intelligence agencies.
“He passed,” said Brooke. He said Habib acknowledged during the screening that as an intelligence professional, Habib has connections with intelligence services in Syria, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran.