Newsweek: CIA report to reveal mock executions
http://rawstory.com/08/news/2009/08/21/newsweek-cia-report-to-reveal-mock-executions/By Muriel Kane Published: August 21, 2009
The long-delayed release of a CIA inspector general’s report has been scooped by Newsweek, which obtained details of the forthcoming report from one source who has read a draft and another who was briefed on its contents.
According to those sources, the report will reveal that the CIA interrogators of suspected USS Cole bomber Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri brandished a gun in front of him in an attempt to make him believe he was going to be shot — thus violating a federal law against threatening a detainee with “imminent death” — and also threatened him with a power drill.
In other cases, mock executions were staged, including one in which a gun was fired in an adjoining room to make a suspect believe another prisoner had been shot.
The report was commissioned by then-CIA Director George Tenet in 2004, as CIA officials attempted to determine whether the use of “enhanced” interrogation techniques had followed official guidelines.
It was shared at the time with the Justice Department and with selected members of the Congressional oversight committees and was shown to the committees as a whole in 2006, but it has been kept secret from the public. An ACLU Freedom of Information lawsuit has now compelled the government to turn the report over by next Monday. Related documents are to be revealed a week later.
It is not clear to what extent the report will be redacted. Last year, a version was released from which the sections on both waterboarding and the ultimate effectiveness of extreme interrogation techniques had been omitted. It is anticipated, however, that the report and other documents will say that extreme techniques did produce some actionable intelligence and that this will further fuel the debate over their use.
Attorney General Eric Holder is also expected to announce a decision on possible investigations into the use of torture under the Bush administration. A group of Republican senators has already sent Holder a letter warning that any investigation “could have a number of serious consequences, not just for the honorable members of the intelligence community, but also for the security of all Americans.”
