STRASBOURG (Chinaview) -- The plenary session of the European Parliament (EP) started here on Wednesday heated debate on a final report on the illegal operations in Europe by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

At around 9:00 a.m. local time, the debate started in the EP headquarters in Strasbourg. Claudio Fava, who led a temporary committee to investigate the CIA flights and secret prisons, opened the debate with explanation remarks.

As many as 60 members of the EP registered to make comment on the issue. By press time, the debate was still going on and the plenary session was to vote on the final report at midday. The draft final report was to conclude that "at least 1,245 flights operated by the CIA flew into European airspace or stopped over at European airports between the end of 2001 and the end of 2005."

It also stated that in some cases the CIA was involved in the "illegal seizure, removal, abduction and detention of terrorist suspects" in Europe. It also criticized the involvement and complicity by certain EU members in the practice.

According to the EP's website, when voted on in the temporary committee, the interim report had 28 in favor, 17 against with 3 abstentions.

An EP press officer told Xinhua that the EP secretariat prepared two version of text for the voting. For the first round, the EP members were to vote on the amended version.

"There are 270 amendments to be voted upon," said the EP website.