|
|
U.S. Senate Report Reveals Brutal CIA Torture
an article by Amy Goodman, Democracy Now
Video: Amy Goodman on CIA torture report
Graphic new details of the post-9/11 U.S. torture
program came to light Tuesday when the Senate
Intelligence Committee released a 500-page
summary of its investigation into the CIA with key
parts redacted. The report concludes that the
intelligence agency failed to disrupt a single plot
despite torturing al-Qaeda and other captives in
secret prisons worldwide between 2002 and 2006,
and details a list of torture methods used on
prisoners, including waterboarding, sexual threats
with broomsticks, and medically unnecessary
"rectal feeding." The report also confirms the CIA
ran black sites in Afghanistan, Lithuania, Romania,
Poland, Thailand, and a secret site on the
Guantánamo Naval Base known as Strawberry
Fields. 
click on photo to enlarge
So far no one involved in the CIA interrogation
program has been charged with a crime except
the whistleblower John Kiriakou. In 2007, he
became the first person with direct knowledge of
the program to publicly reveal its existence. He is
now serving a 30-month sentence.
We speak with Reed Brody, counsel and
spokesperson for Human Rights Watch, who has
written several reports on prisoner mistreatment in
the war on terror, including a 2011 report which
called for a criminal investigation of senior Bush
administration officials.
AMY GOODMAN: Graphic new details of the post-
9/11 U.S. torture program came to light Tuesday
when the Senate Intelligence Committee released
a 500-page summary of its investigation into the
CIA. The report concluded the intelligence agency
failed to disrupt a single plot despite torturing al-
Qaeda and other captives in secret prisons
worldwide between 2002 and 2006. Senator
Dianne Feinstein, chair of the Senate Intelligence
Committee, outlined the report’s key findings.
SEN. DIANNE FEINSTEIN: First, the CIA’s
enhanced interrogation techniques were not an
effective way to gather intelligence information.
Second, the CIA provided extensive amounts of
inaccurate information about the operation of the
program and its effectiveness to the White House,
the Department of Justice, Congress, the CIA
inspector general, the media and the American
public. Third, CIA’s management of the program
was inadequate and deeply flawed. And fourth,
the CIA program was far more brutal than people
were led to believe.
AMY GOODMAN: The Senate report details a list
of torture methods used on prisoners—
waterboarding, sexual threats with broomsticks,
medically unnecessary "rectal feeding." In one
case, a prisoner had his entire "lunch tray" of
hummus, pasta and nuts puréed and administered
by enema. Prisoners were threatened with buzzing
power drills. Some captives were deprived of
sleep for up to 180 hours, at times with their
hands shackled above their heads.
(This article is continued in the discussionboard)
|
|
DISCUSSION
Question(s) related to this article:
Truth Commissions , Do they improve human rights?
* * * * *
LATEST READER COMMENT:
The following is excerpted from an article by Ernesto Semán, professor at the University of Richmond in the U.S. He looks at the recent torture report to the U.S. Senate in the light of the history of U.S. implication in the torture that took place in previous decades in Latin America. As he points out, the torture is only the most recent expression of American policies that amount to a form of state terrorism.
. . . instead of accepting the significance of the war on terror in undermining the rule of law, the report has served the Obama administration as another component of an ideological spinning wheel. . ...more.
|
|
by program area
Become a CPNN Reporter
