If Debat misrepresents and makes up interviews and university degrees, is ABC going to investigate his stories, including the one that the CIA was funding the Baluchis to attack the Tehran regime? Is this recent piece which fueled so much Iran war hysteria for which he was apparently the main source phony too? What's real and what's not? Highly disturbing. I personally tried to probe Debat by email about the Baluchi piece because it conflicted with so much other evidence and reporting and was a subject of great interest to me, after he offered on a Gulf oriented list we're on to answer questions about the piece, but did not get very far, as I remember, he mentioned it was sourced to Pakistani intelligence types. But it was a piece that stood out for me as a red flag. I expressed some skepticism about ABC's spin on a related piece here and here. My understanding is that ABC has severed ties with him since but it does not appear to have acted to investigate or retract the stories. (Read the Pascal Riche piece all the way through, it is truly shocking what he seemingly got away with, a Talented Mr. Ripley story that the American and British and French media have fallen for again and again.)

Update: Alexis Debat sent this rebuttal to the Riche piece:

To Whom It May Concern,

Pascal Riché’s article in “Rue 89” raises very serious questions about my integrity and my credentials, and puts my entire professional life in jeopardy. This is my point by point response below:

1. The interview with Senator Barack Obama did happen through a third party. A journalist named Rob Sherman approached me last spring with an offer to conduct the interview on my behalf. I wrote up the questions and got the answers in writing. My only mistake was to sign this interview in my name, following Rob’s request. I did not conduct this interview in person with the senator, but it did take place. I recognize that putting my name on it was a mistake, for which I take full responsibility.

2. Pascal Riché claims that “I have a reputation for making up stories”. This is a slanderous assertion supported by no facts. In my 5 and a half years at ABC News, I have not once “made up stories” or been suspected of coming forward with false or even weak information. In fact, I have broken many terrorism-related stories over the years. Anybody can check this directly with ABC. If I was such a “fabulist”, as Mr. Riché claims, I would not have survived a single day in such an environment.

3. Mr. Riché claims that I asserted to have a diploma from a fake and fraudulent institution called Edenvale University. I have never made such an assertion, nor claimed to hold a “diploma” from that university. None of the biographies accessible online mention this. I am fully aware that Edenvale University is a false institution. Again, this is a slanderous assertion not supported by any facts.

4. I did work for the Institut Montaigne under Bruno Ehrard-Steiner in 2001-2002, in the very beginning of the organization. I helped Bruno lay out a plan for establishing strategic relations with think-tanks in the United States. This can be checked directly with Mr. Ehrard-Steiner (who is now a spokesperson for Merck France) at bruno_erhard@merck.com .

5. On the subject of the legitimacy of my PhD, the article once again mentions inaccurate and incomplete information. I was indeed recently made aware of an administrative problem with regard to the completion of my PhD, which I am in the process of sorting out through legal means. My thesis was completed in 1999, and is registered at the Sorbonne, as indicated in this website: http://edoc-histoire.univ-paris1.fr/EDvieux/html/doctot.htm. Never did I forge any document or diploma. Mr. Kaspi, who is quoted in the piece, was not my thesis director.

6. I did work for the “Fondation Agir Contre l’Exclusion” as a volunteer in the “preadolescent” program in 1994, doing work on social integration in poor neighborhoods around Paris. This again can be easily checked by contacting any of the fondation’s officials listed here: http://www.fondationface.org/faceframe/frame_contact.htm.

7. The article then proceeds to mention slanderous and inaccurate rumors about my assertions regarding my time in the French military, without mentioning sources or facts. This again appears nowhere in my biographies or CVs, and is pure hearsay and slander.

I take full responsibility for my actions and my credentials. I did make a serious mistake in handling the interview with Senator Barack Obama. But this article is an attempt to discredit and destroy me personally in a slanderous and completely inaccurate way.

I have already taken steps to bring legal action against Mr. Riché and “Rue89”.

In addition, he writes, " ... The Jundullah story came from two very reliable sources, and was confirmed by others at ABC from US sources. ABC only published one-third of what I reported (I had many names, locations, etc.). ABC is currently taking all of my reporting apart, and has not found any reason to doubt it. It will not. I stand completely by 100% of the information I provided ABC."

More here.

Update II: ABC's Senior Vice President Jeffrey Schneider writes, "Above is a link to our blotter story about Debat. In your post re CIA/ Baluchis you write that we reported that the CIA was funding Baluchi. Actually, we were quite careful with our language and did NOT report that. We reported that they were being 'encouraged and advised' - we specifically did not report that they were being funded by the CIA. We have reviewed that story (and all the other stories he worked on) and we had multiple US and European government sources that informed our reporting. As you will see from the blotter story above, we acted expeditiously to sever ties with Debat when we could not establish his credentials and we did immediately investigate his work."

For his part, at the time the relevant story was released, Debat claimed on a list that "I reported this story from Pakistan. The money goes through half a dozen Iranian exiles in Europe and the UAE. I would be more than happy to respond to questions from other members."

When I asked him, "So the US government is directing money through exiles to Reggi? ...," he at first responded that he couldn't answer questions after all; when I protested that he had just offered to do so in the comment above, he said, "It's a CIA op for which the money goes through various exiles in Europe."

When I asked, "But a CIA op whose purpose is to destabilize Iran? Or to gather intel on AQ in Iran? It would be an important distinction ... " Debat responded, "I believe destabilize, but my sources are not from the US intel community, so I don't know what their intent is."

ABC's problem now to sort out.

More here.

Update III: Riche says they confirmed another fake interview with Alan Greenspan (scroll to bottom, Update 12/9).

Posted by Laura at September 11, 2007 12:55 AM