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House speaker claims CIA misled Congress on use of harsh interrogation techniques

By Bernard Hibbitts (editor) and University of Pittsburgh School of Law students.

[JURIST] Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said Thursday that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) misled Congress about the use of enhanced interrogation techniques during the Bush administration. Pelosi, the former top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said that CIA officials had explicitly said that they were not using the controversial waterboarding technique. Pelosi did concede that she had learned in 2003 that harsh techniques were being employed but defended her decision not to speak up over security concerns. Pelosi renewed calls for an independent "truth commission" to investigate alleged abuses committed during the Bush administration. On Wednesday, the Senate Subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts held the first hearing on whether Bush administration interrogation techniques constituted torture. The recent release of four CIA interrogation memos has renewed calls for the criminal prosecution of the memos' authors. Last month, UN special rapporteur on torture Manfred Nowak said that the US must prosecute DOJ lawyers who drafted the memos. US President Barack Obama has said that he would not rule out the possibility of prosecuting lawyers responsible for authoring the memos. Obama had previously said that he would not pursue prosecutions of CIA interrogators, a pledge which drew sharp international criticism.

Full post as published by JURIST - The Paper Chase on May 14, 2009 (boomark / email).