US: Vice-president Dick Cheney's office has become the focus of an investigation into who leaked the name of a CIA officer, according to legal sources.
Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is expected to wrap up his inquiry into the leaking of Valerie Plame's identity as early as this week, and the White House is braced for the possible indictment of such senior figures as Karl Rove, President Bush's senior political adviser, and Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the vice-president's chief of staff.
At least six current and former members of Mr Cheney's staff have appeared before the grand jury, and prosecutors questioned the vice-president himself last year.
At the centre of the inquiry is the issue of whether Ms Plame's identity was leaked in an effort to discredit her husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, who exposed as false the administration's claim before the Iraq war that Saddam Hussein had tried to import nuclear weapons materials from Niger.
The New York Daily News reported yesterday that Mr Fitzgerald was using "a senior co-operating witness" to build a conspiracy case against White House figures.