GENEVA, Jan. 9 (Xinhuanet) -- The Swiss military said Monday that it had launched an investigation into the Sonntags Blick weekly, which reported the country's secret services knew the CIA detained 23 terror suspects in a detention center in Romania.

    Christoph Grenacher, the newspaper's editor-in-chief, would be investigated because of his alleged role in leaking military secrets, the office of the Swiss military's chief judge said.

    The office also said it would investigate who let out the military secret to the Zurich-based weekly.

    According to Swiss martial and criminal laws, those convicted of leaking military secrets would be sentenced to up to five years in prison and fined a considerable sum.

    Sonntags Blick reported on Sunday that the Swiss secret agencies intercepted an Egyptian government fax in November, which said the Egyptian embassy in London learned that 23 Iraqi and Afghan citizens had been questioned by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) at the Mikhail Kogalniceanu base in the Romanian town of Constanza.

    The newspaper also cited a report by the Swiss Defense Ministryas saying Egypt believed there were similar centers in Ukraine, Macedonia and Bulgaria.

    The newspaper said the fax, which was signed by Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit, was the firmest evidence yet of the alleged secret CIA detention centers in Eastern Europe.

    The existence of the secret CIA prisons drew wide criticism among European citizens after it was first reported on Nov. 2 by The Washington Post. Enditem