BUSH INVESTIGATION Probe focuses on reporters in outing of CIA operative

The CIA operative was outed in a syndicated column.
LOS ANGELES TIMES
WASHINGTON -- The investigation into whether the Bush administration illegally exposed the identity of an undercover CIA operative has turned to some of the journalists covering the investigation.
A special prosecutor has asked reporters for The Washington Post and Newsday to sit for questions in connection with the investigation of the case, the papers acknowledged Monday. Other journalists might also be targeted for questioning, sources said.
The informal requests suggest that the investigation started five months ago into the alleged "outing" of CIA operative Valerie Plame may be entering a critical phase. They also raise the possibility of journalists being subpoenaed to testify about the case before a federal grand jury.
The special prosecutor, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, is trying to determine how Plame's CIA connection ended up in a Robert Novak syndicated column published July 14 and whether laws governing the intentional disclosure of agency operatives were broken in the process.
Payback alleged
Plame's husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, has alleged that the exposure was political payback by the Bush White House for his writing an op-ed article, published July 6 in The New York Times, challenging the president's claim in the 2003 State of the Union address that Iraq was seeking to purchase nuclear bomb-making materials from Niger. Wilson had visited the African country to assess the claim for the CIA and had concluded that it was baseless.
Eric Lieberman, associate counsel for The Post, said he received a call from Fitzgerald last week requesting an opportunity to speak with two Post reporters about the case. Lieberman said he had not yet responded to the request. He said Fitzgerald declined to discuss what information he was seeking.
Newsday also acknowledged being approached by Fitzgerald. "We were contacted. Our reporters have not spoken to the government," editor Howard Schneider said in a prepared statement, declining to comment further.
A lawyer for Novak, James Hamilton, declined to comment when asked whether the columnist had received such a request.
Since Attorney General John Ashcroft chose him in December to head up the investigation, Fitzgerald, who is the top federal prosecutor in Chicago, has questioned members of the White House staff and subpoenaed various documents, including transcripts of phone calls from Air Force One.