* Congressional hearing set for Oct. 10
* Clinton sends letter pledging cooperation
* Retired ambassador Pickering to head probe panel
* No details of security requests provided
By Susan Cornwell and Tabassum Zakaria
WASHINGTON, Oct 2 (Reuters) – U.S. officials in Washington
denied repeated requests from Americans in Libya for more
security at the U.S. mission in Benghazi before last month’s
attack that killed four Americans there, two Republican
lawmakers said on Tuesday.
U.S. Representatives Darrell Issa and Jason Chaffetz wrote a
letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton demanding details
of the requests for more security – which they said were made
amid numerous attacks on Westerners in Libya in recent months.
They said the House of Representatives Oversight and
Government Reform Committee will hold an Oct. 10 hearing on the
security situation leading up to the Benghazi attack on Sept.
11.
Clinton responded later on Tuesday with a letter to the
lawmakers saying the State Department would collaborate with the
committee.
Issa heads the panel and Chaffetz oversees its subcommittee
on national security, homeland defense, and foreign operations.
“Multiple U.S. federal government officials have confirmed
to the committee that, prior to the September 11 attack, the
U.S. mission in Libya made repeated requests for increased
security in Benghazi,” Issa and Chaffetz wrote.
“The mission in Libya, however, was denied these resources
by officials in Washington,” the Republican lawmakers said.
Their letter did not include details of the reported requests.
“I appreciate that you and your committee are deeply
interested in finding out what happened leading up to and during
the attacks in Benghazi, and are looking for ways to prevent it
from happening again,” Clinton said in her letter. “I share that
commitment.”
She did not address any of the lawmakers’ claims in her
response.
Clinton said the State Department had named an
“accountability review board” to investigate the Benghazi
attack, headed by retired U.S. diplomat Thomas Pickering.
She said the panel would share its findings with lawmakers
and urged them to hold off on drawing conclusions until they had
seen the State Department’s report.
She said the board would start its work this week and other
members would include Michael Mullen, former chairman of the
U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Separately, four U.S. officials have told Reuters they were
aware that in the months before the Benghazi attack, some U.S.
personnel in Libya had sent complaints to the State Department
expressing concern about security at U.S. diplomatic facilities
in Benghazi, particularly the compound where Ambassador
Christopher Stevens was killed.
Two of those officials said their understanding was that the
department did not act on the complaints before the attack in
Benghazi.
‘DELIBERATE AND ORGANIZED’
Debate over whether the Obama administration was caught
unprepared by an assault by militant groups has become U.S.
election-year fodder.
Republicans have criticized initial statements by
administration officials, including U.S. Ambassador to the
United Nations Susan Rice, who suggested the attacks were
precipitated by anger over an anti-Muslim online video.
Last Friday the top U.S. intelligence authority declared it
believed this was a “deliberate and organized terrorist attack.”
Stevens died of smoke inhalation when he was trapped alone
inside the burning building in Benghazi, Libya’s second city and
the seat of last year’s Feb. 17 revolt against Muammar Gaddafi.
Another diplomat, Sean Smith, also died at the compound. Two
U.S. security personnel were killed later when another U.S.
diplomatic compound to which some personnel retreated came under
mortar attack.
Issa and Chaffetz said the violence was the “latest in a
long line of attacks on Western diplomats and officials in Libya
in the months leading up to” the assault.
Unarmed Libyan guards employed at the U.S. Benghazi mission
were warned by their family members to quit their jobs in the
weeks before the assault, “because there were rumors in the
community of an impending attack,” they said.
Back in April, two Libyans who had been fired from a
contractor providing unarmed security for the Benghazi mission
threw a small homemade bomb over the mission’s fence, the letter
said. No one was hurt and the suspects were arrested but not
prosecuted.
Stevens had also faced threats in Tripoli, according to the
letter.
It said he often took an early-morning run around the Libyan
capital with his security detail, but that in June, “a posting
on a pro-Gaddafi Facebook page trumpeted these runs and directed
a threat against Ambassador Stevens along with a stock photo of
him.”
Stevens stopped the runs for about a week, but then resumed
them, the letter added.
