BRUSSELS, Jan. 18 (Xinhuanet) -- Legislators of the European Union(EU)voted Wednesday for the establishment of a temporary committee to investigate the alleged jails secretly set up in Europe by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

    The European Parliament agreed on the mandate of the ad hoc committee, consisting of 46 EU lawmakers, to investigate claims of the transport and illegal detention of prisoners by the CIA in European countries, the parliament said in a statement.

    The list of the members of the committee will be approved on Thursday.

    The committee will submit "all necessary recommendations" to the parliament and will work "as closely as possible" with other institutions working on the same subject, such as the Council of Europe, according to the statement.

    The committee is expected to deliver its report within four months after it begins to work, the parliament said.

    Unlike a formal one, the ad hoc committee will have no power to force anyone to appear before it.

    The Council of Europe, a major human rights watchdog, opened a probe in November last year into reports that the United States secretly held terrorist suspects in Europe and used European airports to transfer the detainees.

    Italy, Spain and Germany have also launched judicial inquiries into whether their national airports were used in CIA "renditions" of terrorist suspects, or extra-judicial abductions. Last month, Poland followed the suit with a probe of its own.

    Following the Washington Post revelations in November last year that the CIA had covert prisons in Eastern Europe, a human rights group named Poland and Romania as the countries involved. But both countries have denied the charges.

    If found guilty of a grave and sustained breach of the fundamental rights, a member state may face suspension of its voting right in the European Council, or other sanctions recommended by the the European Parliament. The consequences could also affect the accession process for any EU candidate country involved in the alleged activities. Enditem