The arrest of Marco Mancini, a director of a division of the Sismi military intelligence agency, was first leaked by judicial sources and later confirmed in a statement by former Italian President Francesco Cossiga.

An Italian court has issued European arrest warrants for 22 suspected U.S. agents over the abduction, but no Italians had been sought until now.

If an Italian role is confirmed, it would lend evidence to allegations that European countries colluded with the United States in the secret "renditions" of terrorism suspects.

Italian investigators had been wiretapping Nasr before his abduction and accuse him of having ties to al Qaeda and recruiting combatants for Iraq, according to court documents. They say the kidnapping broke Italian law and ruined a promising investigation.

Mancini was accused of collaborating in the kidnap, the sources said, adding that an official statement would be made later on Wednesday by the prosecutor's office.

Cossiga, who is also a former interior minister with close contacts with the secret services, said in a statement that other Sismi officials were also being arrested.

An investigative source said the operation was still in progress.

The chief prosecutor in the case, Armando Spataro, declined comment.

The European Union's Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini said he respected Spataro's decision to arrest Mancini.

"The prosecutor is investigating, he is accusing this officer of the Italian secret service, we'll see whether he is responsible or not," Fratini said in Brussels.

The Abu Omar case is one of the best known examples of alleged CIA secret operations in its war on terror, including the practice of "extraordinary renditions."

Human rights groups condemn the practice, saying suspects have frequently been sent by the United States to countries that practice torture.

Washington acknowledges making secret "rendition" transfers of terrorism suspects between countries, but denies either using torture itself against terrorist suspects or handing them over to countries that do so.

"We are not calling for immediate demonstrations but of course it could happen at some point," Manuel Camacho Solis, the candidate's main political operator, told Reuters.

Mass demonstrations are just one arrow in Lopez Obrador's quiver as he tries to shoot down official returns showing Calderon won by a hair's breadth on Sunday,

"The path of protests is open to us but we've decided not to turn it into our main instrument at the moment," he said. "We are going to do this in stages, responsibly and within the law."

Former Mexico City mayor Lopez Obrador would accept defeat if Mexico's electoral tribunal rules against him, Camacho Solis said. A tribunal decision could take up to two months.

The chance of street protests after the vote has long worried foreign investors concerned that oil-exporter Mexico could be heading for political chaos.

Lopez Obrador brought 250,000 protesters onto the streets last April to oppose a government-backed attempt to ban him from the election race because he had disobeyed a judge's order in a minor land dispute when he was the capital's mayor.

President Vicente Fox gave up the attempt after the massive protests and the case was dropped.

PROTEST HISTORY

Lopez Obrador organized mass demonstrations in his home state of Tabasco when he lost an election for governor in 1994. His followers staged a sit-in that closed down the state government for three weeks, and he led a march of 560 miles to Mexico City to protest.

Lopez Obrador finally lost that fight even though there was clear evidence his opponent exceeded campaign spending limits.

The leftist suspected fraud in the presidential race but would not claim Calderon's side rigged the vote until seeing the result of a recount that begins on Wednesday, Camacho Solis said. "We are sure there are irregularities but we would have to have more elements to be confident enough to call it fraud," he said.

A main concern is that 42 million people voted but only 38.5 million votes were tallied in the preliminary count that Calderon is basing his claims of victory on, he said.

Lopez Obrador's Party of the Democratic Revolution has called for a recount of every single vote.

Mexico's left is especially wary of electoral fraud because it lost a presidential election in 1988 when the government was widely believed to have rigged the vote count.

It is also deeply suspicious of the role in the election of Fox, who it says illegally voiced support for his former energy minister, Calderon.

Camacho Solis said leftists' willingness to protest the election result was greater than the anger at last year's attempt to knock him out of the race. "Walking in the streets you get people asking us not to let this one go. That's what people want. Here you have a bigger social movement," he said.

Some protesters said their fast would continue beyond July 4th.

Anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq, said she would drink only water throughout the summer, which she said she would spend outside President George W. Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas.

"This war is a crime," Sheehan told a crowd of clapping, cheering protesters. "We represent millions of Americans who withdraw their support from this government."

The demonstrators crouched in the muggy evening next to a piece of pink plastic, spread down the road as a table and table-cloth in one. It was covered with wilted pink sunflowers and plates of vegetarian curry, white rice, and beans.

The demonstration aimed at highlighting the costs of the war, in which more than 2,500 U.S. soldiers and thousands of Iraqis have died, said CodePink spokeswoman Meredith Dearborn.

"We have to put our own lives on the line, and I'm willing to do that," said activist Diane Wilson, who pledged to fast until the United States withdraws from Iraq.

Dearborn said 2,700 other activists nationwide, including actors Susan Sarandon and Sean Penn, would work as a relay team passing the fast daily from one to another.

Lieberman's grin didn't break. Jogging to keep pace, the Connecticut Democrat responded with kisses -- some blown to the crowd, others of the Hershey's variety, distributed by campaign volunteers.

When one heckler marched alongside the senator and continued to hurl vitriol in his direction, Lieberman's wife, Hadassah, suggested a response.

"Send him a kiss," Hadassah Lieberman said. Campaign aides obliged, with chocolate.

It was a clever play on the purported "kiss" that has become the most famous embrace in this state's political history.

A few hundred yards behind the Liebermans, giant papier-mâché heads of Lieberman and President Bush were locking lips in a pose meant to evoke memories of the president's bear hug of Lieberman -- the senator insists that no kiss was involved -- after Bush's 2005 State of the Union address.

"Just [politically] married," read the sign on the back of the float, which was constructed by some of the liberal bloggers who are backing Lieberman's challenger, Ned Lamont.

A day after sending a jolt through the political establishment by saying he will run for a fourth term even if he loses the Democratic nomination, Lieberman confronted face-to-face much of the anger that has fueled the campaign of Lamont. The cheers for Lieberman still generally swamped the boos, but the senator saw up close what he's up against in the final month of the Democratic primary campaign.

Lieberman pronounced himself unconcerned about the reaction, calling his critics a "distinct minority." He said he still thinks he'll win the Aug. 8 primary, and said members of all parties in Connecticut will ultimately support him because they respect his heartfelt belief that the war in Iraq remains necessary.

"I am a hugger, not a hater," Lieberman said after the parade in Willimantic, a small town about 30 miles east of Hartford. "But when I disagree, I'm going to have the courage of my convictions to do what's right for my state or my country."

But Lamont said Lieberman's decision to begin collecting signatures for a possible run as an unaffiliated candidate confirms what he's been saying about the senator all along: that he too often stands against the interest of Democrats.

"Senator Lieberman every day inches more and more toward non-Democrat status," Lamont said. "Too often he hedges his bets. People want to know who you are, what you believe, and what you stand for."

Lamont drew virtually no hecklers yesterday in Willimantic, and was swarmed for handshakes by Democrats who said they're fed up with Lieberman. In a vacation-season election, fervor for Lamont -- and against Lieberman -- could be decisive, said Paul Best, a political science professor at Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven.

"I don't feel a passion, frankly, for Lieberman," Best said. "If there is a passion, it is going to be on the side of Lamont, because of the war situation."

It is the Iraq war above all else where Lieberman's break with party orthodoxy has upset the voters who have sent him to the Senate for three terms.

Mary Thompson, a travel agent who saw Lamont march yesterday in Canterbury, said Lieberman's position on the war shows that he's working to advance his own agenda more than representing the views of Connecticut voters.

"I've always thought Joe Lieberman is a very good man, but lately, he seems like a Bush man, not a Democrat," Thompson said. "He's not there to state his own opinions. He's there for representing the people who put him in office."

Terry Jackson, a 63-year-old T-shirt printer who lives in Pomfret, said the fact that Lieberman would maneuver around the Democratic Party to get on the ballot shows that he has been in Washington too long.

"They get really complacent after they're in office for a while," Jackson said.

"We've got to get some new blood in there."

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, one of the nation's most visible Democrats, issued a statement yesterday saying that while she supports Lieberman in the primary, she will back Lamont if Lamont beats him.

"I have been pleased to support [Lieberman] in his campaign for reelection, and hope that he is our party's nominee," the former first lady said in the statement. "But I want to be clear that I will support the nominee chosen by Connecticut Democrats in their primary."

Lieberman is calculating that many of the same voters he is asking to respect his position on Iraq will also respect his determination to stay in the race regardless of the primary's outcome.

"I want to make sure, after 18 years of service to all the people of the state, that I give all the people the decision in November as to whether they want me to continue to work for them," Lieberman said yesterday. "I'm going to be there on Nov. 7 one way or the other, but I hope to be there as the Democratic nominee."

Polls show that while Lamont is gaining ground in a head-to-head matchup against Lieberman, Lieberman would probably beat Lamont and Republican Alan Schlesinger in a three-way general-election race, in which all the state's voters can participate.

But Lamont said the race's dynamic would shift if he beats Lieberman.

"If we win, we're going to energize Democrats who have been sitting on the sidelines for an awful long time," Lamont said. "It's going to be a tidal wave. If Senator Lieberman leaves the party, I think Democrats are going to rally behind our campaign."

Each administration since 1966 has used every tool at its disposal to thwart disclosure of information it deems dangerous or embarrassing. The Bush administration is no different, often citing the changed security environment after the Sept. 11 terror attacks as justification for secrecy.

"The marching orders are now: if there's a basis to withhold, do it," said Elizabeth Withnell, chief counsel at the Department of Homeland Security's Privacy Office.

The law, commonly known as FOIA, presumes that federal records will generally be available to the public. But Congress gave agencies nine broad exemptions they could use to withhold records from the public, including the press.

An analysis of annual FOIA reports from 13 Cabinet-level departments shows that between 2000 and 2004, the number of fully granted FOIA requests fell by 27 percent.

Increasingly, agencies are relying on one of several "executive privilege" claims to deny the release of data and documents. During the 2000-2004 period, the use of those claims to withhold information nearly doubled.

Daniel Metcalfe, director of the Justice Department's Office of Information and Privacy, defended the increased use of the executive privilege exemption, saying it "must be viewed in light of increased sensitivity of information in a post 9/11 context." Metcalfe's office oversees all federal Freedom of Information activity.

Open government advocates say agencies are now using creative interpretations of the FOIA exemptions to conceal as much information as possible.

For example, in November 2001 the military unilaterally decided to remove nearly all proper names from documents it releases, citing a FOIA exemption meant to protect employees' privacy. Between 2000 and 2005, the Defense Department's use of that exemption to withhold information jumped 42 percent.

Pentagon FOIA officers say this has been necessary to protect employee safety. But open government advocates say it's been abused to withhold information such as names of key decision-makers.

"They're taking a legitimate exemption and turning it on its head," said Christopher Farrell, director of investigations and research at Judicial Watch, a conservative government watchdog group that regularly uses FOIA to request government documents.

He said that among government agencies, the Pentagon uses "the most outrageous, novel application" of the FOIA privacy exemption.

"We have reams of paper where every proper name is knocked off," Farrell said. "That exemption talks about personnel records and medical files, and other similar files. It doesn't say you can't use any proper names. The reason (the Pentagon) doesn't follow the letter or spirit of FOIA is, they're attempting to conceal who's making decisions on stuff; who's approving things."

Judicial Watch is one of several groups that has had to resort to lawsuits to force the government to turn over documents.

A study released last week found a sharp increase in the backlog of requests under the Freedom of Information Act. The 22 departments and agencies studied by the non-partisan Coalition of Journalists for Open Government found there were 148,603 FOIA requests unprocessed at the end of last year, or 31 percent of the total number of requests. The backlog was 20 percent in 2004.

The study also found that it was not uncommon for businesses or individuals to wait years for agencies to process "complex" requests, which typically involve tracking down and analyzing a series of records. The median waiting time for complex requests to the Securities and Exchange Commission was 410 working days.