Constitutional Law
ABC: White House Micromanaged Torture
Posted Apr 11, 2008, 10:32 am CST
By Martha Neil
In detailed discussions in the White House basement, top aides to President Bush micromanaged at least several torture sessions of terrorist suspects, starting in 2002, a major newspaper says.
Relying on an ABC News report televised earlier this week, Washington Post columnist Dan Froomkin writes that a group including Vice President Dick Cheney, John Ashcroft (then the attorney general), Colin Powell (then the secretary of state), Condoleezza Rice (then the national security adviser), Donald Rumsfeld (then the defense secretary) and George Tenet (then the CIA director) "virtually choreographed" some interrogation sessions. Rice reportedly chaired the meetings.
"Highly placed sources said a handful of top advisers signed off on how the CIA would interrogate top al-Qaida suspects—whether they would be slapped, pushed, deprived of sleep or subjected to simulated drowning, called waterboarding," the network says in a written account quoted by Froomkin.
View a video of the ABC News program here, or read the written ABC News account of the meetings here.
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