Afghanistan Politics 

Analysis of the report published about CIA torture

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The U.S. Senate Selected Commission on Intelligence[1] report about the questioning and torture of the prisoners, which is mainly called report of torture of prisoners by CIA, is written in 6,000 pages. The Chairperson of the commission Dianne Feinstein [2] published the summary of the report from the beginning to the end of the report in 525 pages[3]. And made it non-confidential.

As they did not publish the rest of the 6,000 pages of the report, it seems that the torture of CIA are more than what are published in the small piece of report that is published; still the small summary of the report has the parts that brought black spots on the human rights claims of the U.S. in the international community.

Background and Research Method of the Report:

As on September 11th 2001, the World Trade Center, in New York City, attacked by Al Qaida Network, by publishing a decree[4] on September 17th 2001 the U.S. President of the time George W. Bush allowed CIA for torturing the prisoners. And after that the torture and questioning program of CIA began.

Based on the mentioned program, there were 113 people tortured till 2004, later on 4 people in 2005, one person in 2006, and one other was tortured in 2007, so overall there were 119 people tortured up to 2007.

The latest torture of the mentioned program of CIA was done on November 8th 2007, and in April 2008 CIA did not have any person for torture; therefore, the report of the Senate claims that the torture program of CIA stopped in 2007. But still it is not clear either the U.S. Forces still use those inhumane and cruel torture for gaining information, or not?

The Commission of the U.S. Senate started research about torture and questioning program of CIA in March of 2009; and according to the chairperson of the commission, the foundation of the research was based on the videos that were published related to the torture of prisoners by CIA in 2007[5].

Overall, the report discusses the torture of prisoners by CIA since the incident of 9/11 to 2006, and it is supported by 2794 references.

The officials of the commission, since the beginning of 2009 to the end of 2012, collected more than 6 million data sources about the torture of CIA in prisons, the data sources includes; operational and intelligence reports, internal dairies and emails, information of meetings, texts of interviews, contracts and so on. So after analysis of the data the commission prepared the report. Overall, the report is written based on primary sources, which most of those were confidential information.

The first draft of the research was written in October of 2011, and on December 13th 2012 the research was completed. On 3rd April 2014, the Senate Selected Commission of Intelligence decided to send the result and findings of the research with its summary to the U.S. president, so president will order publication of the mentioned confidential research to be exposed. So later on, it will be available for everyone.

Result and Findings of the Report:

The result and finding of the mentioned report is written in 19 pages, which are, overall, 20 findings that are mentioned as below:

  1. The CIA’s use of its enhanced interrogation techniques was not an effective means of acquiring intelligence or gaining cooperation from detainees.
  2. The CIA’s justification for the use of its enhanced interrogation techniques rested on inaccurate claims of their effectiveness.
  3. The interrogations of CIA detainees were brutal and far worse than the CIA represented to policymakers and others.
  4. The conditions of confinement for CIA detainees were harsher than the CIA had represented to policymakers and others.
  5. The CIA repeatedly provided inaccurate information to the Department of Justice (DOJ), impeding a proper legal analysis of the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program.
  6. The CIA has actively avoided or impeded congressional oversight of the program.
  7. The CIA impeded effective White House oversight and decision-making.
  8. The CIA’s operation and management of the program complicated, and in some cases impeded, the national security missions of other Executive Branchagencies.
  9. The CIA impeded oversight by the CIA’s Office of Inspector General.
  10. The CIA coordinated the release of classified information to the media, including inaccurate information concerning the effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
  11. The CIA was unprepared as it began operating its Detention and Interrogation Program more than six months after being granted detention authorities.
  12. The CIA’s management and operation of its Detention and Interrogation Program was deeply flawed throughout the program’s duration, particularly so in 2002 and early 2003.
  13. Two contract psychologists devised the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques and played a central role in the operation, assessments, and management of the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program. By 2005, the CIA had overwhelmingly outsourced operations related to the program.
  14. CIA detainees were subjected to coercive interrogation techniques that had not been approved by the Department of Justice or had not been authorized by CIA Headquarters.
  15. The CIA did not conduct a comprehensive or accurate accounting of the number of individuals it detained, and held individuals who did not meet the legal standard for detention. The CIA’s claims about the number of detainees held and subjected to its enhanced interrogation techniques were inaccurate.
  16. The CIA failed to adequately evaluate the effectiveness of its enhanced interrogation techniques.
  17. The CIA rarely reprimanded or held personnel accountable for serious or significant violations, inappropriate activities, and systematic and individual management failures.
  18. The CIA marginalized and ignored numerous internal critiques, criticisms, and objections concerning the operation and management of the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program.
  19. The CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program was inherently unsustainable and had effectively ended by 2006 due to unauthorized press disclosures, reduced cooperation from other nations, and legal and oversight concerns.
  20. The CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program damaged the United States’ standing in the world, and resulted in other significant monetary and non-monetary costs[6][7].

Methods of CIA Torture:

The first person that was tortured by CIA was Abu Zubaida, who was arrested by Pakistan Army and submitted to the U.S., it is said that the U.S. Forces kept him in Bagram Prison. The CIA methods of torture was practiced on him every week, even every day. They were slapping him, binding him to wall, giving him insomnia, and baring him.

One of the methods of CIA torture was waterboarding[8] technic, which was physically very harmful. According to the report, Abo Zubaida would become unconscious and droplets would come out of his mouth. According to the internal records of CIA, Khalid Sheikh Mohammad reached the state of real water drowning[9].

Another type of torture was insomnia, which a prisoner would be kept in insomnia up to 180 hours, sometimes they would kept then standing, or sometimes their hands would be tied above their heads. Other types of tortures were; standing them in cold water, standing them with broken bones for many hours, raping them, and other inhumane and cruel types of torture.

As the Americans think that since 2012 up to now seven prisoners committed suicide because of the tortures; but still it is not clear either those prisoners committed suicide, or they were martyred by Americans? An Afghan Prisoner by the name of Gul Rahman was also killed by the tortures of the Americans in 2012.

The CIA tortures and Human Rights:

Based on the first article of the UN convention against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment[10], punishment is defined as physical or/and mental pain that third party use it for the purpose of obtaining information. Based on the second article of the convention, all the judiciary, executive and administrative institutions prevent such tortures.

Overall, we can say that the two main purposes of the convention are; firstly preventing tortures, and secondly, the ones that torture should be punished.

Based on the mentioned convention of the UN, which the U.S. also signed it as many other countries and approved it in 1994, the U.S. violated human rights, prisoners’ rights, and the UN international convention, and those that were involved in those inhuman and cruel torture should be punished[11].

The U.S. in Battle with its own values:

The U.S. media and most of the U.S. officials claim that democracy, human rights, respect to the sovereignty of others, moral values, and other values are the values of their country; but to what extent is the U.S. truthful about its mentioned values? If we only point out the U.S. activities in last one decade, we will see such an image of the U.S. that its activities are against its values, if it really has any values.

On one hand, the U.S. shout the slogan of democracy and use it against those that are risk for their interests; the blame Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran that they do not implement democracy in their countries, but on the other hand, it supports the military coup de ta against the elected president of Egypt.

Though, on one hand, the U.S. says that the intervention of Russia in Ukraine in against the independency of Ukraine, on the other hand, it invaded Afghanistan and Iraq at the beginning of twenty first century, and during the Arab Spring it militarily intervened in Libya and other countries. Wasn’t those interventions against the national sovereignty and independency of those countries?

On one hand, the U.S. shouts the slogan of democracy and blame North Korea, Iran, Russia, China, and other Muslim countries for that, on the other hand, they have done those inhuman and cruel activities in Abu Ghuraib, Bagram, and Guantanamo Prisons which would be dishonor for it for many centuries. It is crystal clear for the international community that the U.S. does not have any values, or it has a political aspect.

The End

[1]United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence

[2]Dianne Feinstein, Chairman Senate Select Committee on Intelligence

[3]The preface of Dianne Feinstein in the report is 6 pages, result and findings of the report is 19 pages, and the rest of 499 pages are all the summary of the report, which overall it is 525 pages.

[4]Memorandum of notification (MON)

[5]The preface of the Chairperson of the U.S. Senate Selected Commission on Intelligence Dianne Feinstein: first page.

[6]Read the Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Detention and Interrogation Program (Pages: 9-25)

[7]Based on the report of the Senate, the U.S. spent 300 million dollars on the program and it resulted the destruction of the U.S. relations with its alliances.

[8]One of the methods of torturing the prisoners was that they would lay down the prisoner on a board, the prisoner’s foot would be higher than his head (feet and hands would be banded to the same board) and they would pure water on the breathing area of the prisoner continuously, as the result of which the prisoner would feel as being sink in water, that is why this method of torture is called waterboarding.

[9]The report referred to a related email about this, but still the email is not exposed that from whom was it sent and who was the receiver of the email. Read about it:
Committee study of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Detention and Interrogation Program (Pp: 10-25)

[10]Convention against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment

[11]The UN also raised its voice that those who are involved in the torturing and questioning program of CIA should be punished. Read the report of the UN in the website of human rights that is in the below link:

http://www.hrw.org/news/2014/12/13/cia-torturers-should-be-prosecuted

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