Bruguière counselled Italian senator Paolo Guzzanti ("Forza Italia"), in charge of the Mitrokhin Commission, endorsing the old thesis, once supported by the CIA, according to which the Soviet Union was behind Mehmet Ali Agca's 1981 assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II. The Mitrokhin Commission has been discredited following a manipulation by a network to defame Prime minister Romano Prodi and other political opponents of Berlusconi, by claiming they worked for the KGB. The network included Mario Scaramella, arrested in December 2006, the head of SISMI Nicolò Pollari, n°2 of SISMI Marco Mancini (both indicted in the "Imam Rapito affair"), as well as Robert Seldon Lady, CIA station chief in Milan, also indicted in the "Imam Rapito" affair.