Plame considering suing former State Department official in CIA leak case
WASHINGTON — Former CIA officer Valerie Plame is considering suing the recent No. 2 State Department official in a case accusing members of the Bush administration of conspiring to leak her identity to the media, Plame’s attorney said Tuesday.
Official State Department calendars, provided to the Associated Press under the Freedom of Information Act, show then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage held a one-hour meeting marked "private appointment” with Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward on June 13, 2003.
That was the same day Woodward met with a confidential source who spoke to him about Plame, according to a person familiar with information gathered by prosecutors. The person spoke only on condition of anonymity because the material remains sealed.
Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has investigated whether Bush administration officials intentionally revealed Plame’s identity as a one-time CIA covert official.
Lech Walesa has quit the Solidarity trade union that he founded
WARSAW, Poland — Lech Walesa said Tuesday he has quit the Solidarity trade union that he founded and which helped bring down communism in Eastern Europe.
"I have given up my membership last year because Solidarity and I have gone separate ways,” he told the Associated Press.
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Walesa also said he plans to stay away from events marking the 26th anniversary of Solidarity’s founding on Aug. 31 in part because he disapproves of the union’s support for Poland’s new conservative leaders.
The 62-year-old Nobel Peace laureate said he left after Solidarity members ignored his criticism of their support for the Law and Justice Party and its leaders, twin brothers Lech and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, during last fall’s election campaign.
Lech Kaczynski won the presidency and Jaroslaw is now prime minister.
"When my arguments were not reaching them, I gave instructions to terminate my membership,” Walesa said. "It is not over the Kaczynskis, but that was the last straw.”
"I am not paying my fees any more,” he added.
Walesa founded Solidarity in 1980 at the shipyards in Gdansk. It was a broad social movement made up of workers and intellectuals that opposed communism.
Despite being forced underground in the harsh martial law crackdown begun in 1981, it persevered and eventually succeeded in helping to bring down the communist regime in 1989.
Since then, it has become a trade union like any other, representing a range of workers. Although it has lost much of its original influence, it is the second-largest trade union in the country and its members are a visible presence during worker protests.<

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