Report on Covert Operations Denied

WASHINGTON — White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater today angrily denied and branded as “interestingly timed” a report that intelligence counterterrorism directives signed by President Reagan in 1984 and 1985 authorized aggressive covert operations that would have circumvented a ban on assassinations.

Fitzwater told reporters that the report by The Washington Post “impugns the President” and Reagan “thinks it’s very unfair.”

The Post story said the directives, called findings signed by Reagan, said that any operations taken against terrorists would be “deemed” lawful if conducted in “good faith.”