Germans Need Stasi File Software BERLIN (AP) - After waiting more than a decade for the CIA to return East German secret police files obtained after the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, German officials said Thursday they lack the computer software needed to analyze the information. Officials believe the former Stasi files, said to contain some 320,000 names, could expose many agents who operated in the West during the Cold War. The CIA, which acquired the records under circumstances never officially explained, agreed last year to return them, except for data that may compromise U.S. sources. The first CD-ROM was delivered to Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's office last month. But Interior Ministry spokesman Rainer Lingenthal said that the government was still waiting for the United States to approve an export license for the database software needed to evaluate the information properly. The government also has to decide whether to purchase one or two licenses for the software because it's not sure how many agencies will have access to the data, he said. Government spokesman Uwe-Karsten Heye said last week that the first CD-ROM arrived at the chancellery on March 31, and that some 1,000 further discs were expected to follow over the next 1 1/2 years.
