AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE,
NEW YORK: A former US marine who worked at the White House on Thursday admitted passing “Top Secret” information to Philippines political figures to help an attempt to overthrow the government there.
Filipino-American Leandro Aragoncillo, 47, admitted he met co-conspirators at the Malacanang presidential palace in Manila, in January 2001, the US Justice Department said.
Former Philippine president Joseph Estrada, who is on trial on corruption charges, last week denied allegations that he was part of a conspiracy to steal classified US documents.
Press reports said US authorities believe the case was part of a plot to unseat President Gloria Arroyo, who came to power after a military-backed revolt in January 2001 ended Estrada's six-year term.
US prosecutors were said to have identified Estrada, opposition Senator Panfilo Lacson and former House of Representatives speaker Arnulfo Fuentebella as being part of the plot, reports said.
Aragoncillo, who was born in the Philippines, pleaded guilty to four counts in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury in Newark, New Jersey.
One charged him with conspiracy to transmit national defence information, the second with transmitting national defence information.
The third charge was unlawful retention of national defence information and the fourth unlawful use of a government computer.
He faces a maximum punishment of life imprisonment on the first two counts.
For the other two charges there is a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.
A Justice Department statement said Aragoncillo got the secrets while working in the office of Vice President Dick Cheney and his predecessor Al Gore.
He was an FBI intelligence analyst at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey when arrested on September 10, 2005 along with a former Philippine police official, Michael Ray Aquino.
Aragoncillo admitted that his espionage activity continued during his time as an FBI analyst, the statement said.
The information was handed on to “senior political and government officials” in the Philippines who were not named.
One was identified as “a senior member of the executive branch” from June 1998 through January 2001; another was a senator who had served since June 2001 and was formerly the head of the Philippines National Police. A third was a member of the Philippines House of Representatives between 1998 and 2001 and again from 2004. A fourth was a representative who served from 1992-2001 and again in 2004, and the fifth a mayor of a city near Manila.
The statement said Aragoncillo first met the senior “executive branch” official at the Malacanang Palace on January 12, 2001 — eight days before Estrada was ousted.
He was said to have collected classified reports from the White House and given them to the same official in June 2001, after Arroyo had taken power.
“Aragoncillo admitted that he regularly transferred to his Philippine contacts national security documents classified as 'Secret', and that the information could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of a foreign nation,” the statement said.
The former marine said that in telephone and email messages “with Senator No. 1, he advised that the information he was transferring would be useful in assisting Senator No. 1 and his associates in their attempts to destabilize and overthrow the president and government of the Philippines,” said the statement.
He was quoted as saying that in one conversation, Aragoncillo “told Senator No. 1 that the documents were like a 'blueprint' on how to engineer a coup.”
The information, leaked between October 2000 and February 2002, included information marked “Top Secret” that related to terrorist threats to US interests in the Philippines, the statement said.
US Attorney Christopher Christie of New Jersey district said: “His betrayal is profound and a disservice to his country.”
Aquino, a former Philippines police official, was also detained last September. He was among those to whom Aragoncillo is alleged to have passed classified information.
