US President Barack Obama paid tributes to the seven CIA officers killed in a suicide attack in Afghanistan, at a rare memorial service at the spy agency headquarters in Virginia. In a break with tradition, the President delivered the eulogy to an audience of about 1,000 CIA employees, relatives of the slain CIA agents, lawmakers and officials in which he hailed them as patriots. Obama said, that for more than 60 years, security reasons demanded that the work of CIA remain largely unknown but today, the gratitude of American citizens demands that they speak of the seven American patriots who loved their country and gave their lives to defend it.<br/><br/>The seven agents were killed in a suicide attack in Afghanistan on December 30, when a Jordanian double agent who had been brought to the US base in Khost after promising to share intelligence on Al-Qaeda blew himself up. The bomber, Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, had convinced his Jordanian handlers he had put his militant past behind him and was ready to cooperate with US forces, while instead he was actually planning the attack. It was the deadliest attack on the CIA since 1983, dealing a severe blow to the agencies efforts in tracking the Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants in Afghanistan.