North America & Oceania

Senate Panel Votes To Release CIA Torture Report

By: Brandon R. Cottrell 
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America 

WASHINGTON, D.C., United States – The Senate Intelligence Committee voted last week to release parts of a four year long report that investigated CIA terror interrogations during the Bush administration.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, who voted in favor of releasing the report, described the results as “shocking” and that such a program “must never be allowed to happen again” (Photo Courtesy Washington Post).

The panel, which is comprised of fourteen members, had eleven members voting in favor of release and three members (Republican Senators Marco Rubio of Florida, Dan Coats of Indiana and Jim Risch of Idaho) voting against release of five hundred pages (out of six thousand total pages) of the report.

Though the report needs to be declassified, the release should still provide the fullest account of the enhanced interrogation techniques that were used.  According to members of the intelligence community, however, the report will not paint a full picture as the underlying investigation “fail[ed] to include interviews from top spy agency officials who authorized or supervised the brutal interrogations.”

Senator Richard Burr, who voted in favor of releasing the report, believes that the report is “flawed and biased” but thought it important “to give the American people the opportunity to make their judgments.”

Amid concerns that the CIA will “sanitize key elements of their investigation” as they redact passages that could comprise national security, the White House reported that it would instruct intelligence officials to cooperate fully with the pending release.

Additionally, Dean Boyd, a CIA spokesman, said that the agency would “carry out the review expeditiously” and that “we owe it to the men and women directed to carry out this program to try and ensure that any historical account is accurate.”

Senator Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, stated that “”The purpose of this review was to uncover the facts behind the secret program and the results, I think, were shocking . . . the report exposes brutality that stands in sharp contrast to our values as a nation [and] it chronicles a stain on our history that must never be allowed to happen again.  This is not what Americans do.”  Feinstein has additionally stated that she hopes the report will be released to the public within thirty days.

Amnesty International issued a statement with similar sentiments, stating that “the interrogation techniques amount to torture and therefore violated international law” and that it wished the report would be released in full but acknowledged that “given the systematic failure of the U.S. authorities to declassify and disclose anything like the full truth . . .  any transparency on them is a step in the right direction.”

The report accuses the CIA of overstating the significance of alleged terrorist plots and prisoners, and exaggerating the effectiveness of the program by claiming credit for information surrendered before they were subjected to the interrogations.

 

For further information, please see the following: 

AP – Senate Panel Votes To Release CIA Torture Report – 3/April/14

New York Times – Senate Panel Votes To Reveal Report On C.I.A. Interrogations – 3/April/14

USA Today – Senate Panel Votes To Declassify Part Of CIA Report – 3/April/14

Washington Post – Senate Panel Votes To Release CIA Interrogation Report – 3/April/14

District Court Judge Dismisses Suit Over Drone Strike Deaths

by Michael Yoakum
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America

WASHINGTON, D.C., United States – A federal judge dismissed an action against top Obama administration officials Friday brought by family members of three American citizens killed in a drone strike in Yemen, including Anwar al-Awlaki.  While D.C. district court Judge Rosemary Collyer said the case “raises fundamental issues regarding constitutional principles,” she announced that she will grant the government’s motion to dismiss.

al-Alwaki, a radical Muslim cleric and US citizen, was killed by a drone strike in Yemen in 2011. (photo courtesy of The Guardian).

The ACLU and the Center for Constitutional Rights represented the families of the three men killed in the drone strikes: al-Awlaki, his son Abdulrahman, and Samir Khan, a naturalized citizen who moved to Yemen in 2009 to work for an English language magazine.  The suit named former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, CIA Director David Patraeus, and two commanders in the military’s Special Operations Command.

Judge Collyer, in her 41 page opinion, ruled that courts should hesitate to hold government officials personally liable for violating citizens’ constitutional rights during wartime.

“The persons holding the jobs of the named defendants must be trusted and expected to act in accordance with the U.S. Constitution when they intentionally target a U.S. citizen abroad at the direction of the president and with the concurrence of Congress,” Collyer wrote, adding “They cannot be held personally responsible in monetary damages for conducting war.”

The ruling, if it stands, suggests that the Judiciary has no role in evaluating the legality of the Executive’s decision to kill American citizens in overseas operations when officials have deemed those citizens to be terrorists.

Brian Fallen, a Department of Justice spokesman, stated that the district court reached the correct decision.  Lawyers from the Center for Constitutional Rights say they have not decided whether they will appeal the decision.

Lawyers from the ACLU were vocal about their distaste for the court’s ruling. “This is a deeply troubling decision that treats the government’s allegations as proof while refusing to allow those allegations to be tested in court,” ACLU lawyer Hina Shamsi said.

The Obama administration is separately fighting Freedom of Information Act requests brought by the New York Times and ACLU seeking disclosure of a memo authored by the Department of Justice laying out the legal justification for the strikes.  Presently a summary of that legal reasoning has been unclassified and made available to the public.

For more information, please see:

Associated Press – Judge dismisses lawsuit over drone strikes – 4 April 2014

The Guardian – Drone killings case thrown out in US – 4 April 2014

The New York Times – Judge Dismisses Suit Against Administration Officials Over Drone Strikes – 4 April 2014

Reuters – Lawsuit over American drone strikes dismissed by U.S. judge – 4 April 2014

The Washington Post – Judge dismisses lawsuit over drone strikes in Yemen that killed American Anwar al-Awlaki – 4 April 2014

US Senate Report Identifies CIA Torture

By: Brandon R. Cottrell 
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America

WASHINGTON, D.C., United States – A recent US Senate report states that the CIA used secret “black sites” during the presidency of George W. Bush to interrogate prisoners—interrogation techniques included dunking the suspects in cold water, and smashing their heads against walls, both of which were not on the Justice Department’s approved list of techniques.

The US Senate’s report issued findings that the CIA, under Former President George W. Bush, used “black sites” to torture suspects using illegal techniques (Photo Courtesy BBC).

The report is broken down into three parts; “one that traces the chronology of interrogation operations, another that assesses intelligence officials’ claims and a third that contains case studies on virtually every prisoner held in CIA custody since the program began in 2001.”

Those familiar with the “black sites” report that the interrogations provided little useful intelligence information and that much of the intelligence that was claimed to result from the interrogations were exaggerated in an attempt to justify the program.  For example, one official said that they water-boarded one suspect over eighty times and that the only valuable information that came from that suspect was revealed prior to the water boarding.

One U.S. Official stated that “The CIA described [its program] repeatedly both to the Department of Justice and eventually to Congress as getting unique, otherwise unobtainable intelligence that helped disrupt terrorist plots and save thousands of lives [but] was that actually true?  The answer is no.”

Kevin Drum, a political blogger, echoed those feelings when he said that “the torture was even worse than we thought; it produced very little in the way of actionable intelligence; and the CIA lied about this in order to preserve their ability to torture prisoners.  Anybody who isn’t sickened by this needs to take very long, very deep look into their souls.”

The CIA has not yet formally commented on the report, as it as yet to see the final version of the report.  However, those who have seen the report suggest that it contained factual errors and misguided conclusions.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney continues to defend the program, saying, “If I would have to do it all over again, I would. The results speak for themselves.”

The Senate Intelligence Committee that has been investigating the CIA since 2009 will decide this week whether to send a summarized version of the report, which is over six thousand pages long, to President Obama who could then decide to release the report to the public.

 

For more information, please see the following:

BBC News – Secret US Senate Report Details CIA Abuse – 1-04-2014

Business Insider – CIA Torture: It Was Worse Than Anyone Knew – 01-04-2014

MSNBC – Report: CIA Deceived On Torture – 01-04-2014

Washington Post – CIA Misled On Interrogation Program, Senate Report Says – 31-03-2014

Nine Nuclear Commanders Fired in Cheating Scandal

by Michael Yoakum
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America

WASHINGTON, D.C., United States – Nine Air Force commanders were fired Thursday after being implicated in scandal involving cheating on nuclear proficiency tests.  Air Force leadership additionally will discipline dozens of junior officers posted at Malmstrom Air Force Base, a nuclear missile base in Montana.

Col. Robert Stanley, who was led Malmstrom’s 341st Missile Wing, reportedly resigned in light of the cheating scandal. (photo courtesy of BBC News)

Though not directly involved in the cheating scandal, the nine commanders held leadership positions at Malmstrom.  Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James said the nine “failed to provide adequate oversight of their crew force.”  Those firings were in addition to Col. Stanley, who resigned from his post Thursday.

“Leadership’s focus on perfection led commanders to micromanage their people,” said Lt. Gen. Stephen Wilson, commander of the Air Force Global Strike Command.  Wilson added “Leaders lost sight of the fact that execution in the field is more important than what happens in the classroom.”

Officers at Malmstrom were under pressure to achieve 100% proficiency on regular tests when only 90% was required, perhaps precipitating the cheating scandal.

James indicated Thursday that 100 junior officers were implicated in the cheating scandal, either for participating or overlooking the cheating. Nine of those officers were cleared of charges while the remainder received punishments ranging from letters of counseling to courts-martial. 30-40 of those officers are expected to be retrained and returned to duty.

Disciplinary measures are one of a variety of changes expected to affect the Air Force’s intercontinental ballistic missile programs, according to both James and Wilson.  Other issues to be addressed are morale and the micromanagement of lower-level officers.  James, while optimistic about the changes, cautioned that progress will likely be slow.

“The issues that we have before us today are tough, and they didn’t come overnight . . . While we have progress in certain areas in recent years, there is more work to be done,” James said.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel also expressed concern about the state of morale and discipline among nuclear officers.  Hagel instituted a review of nuclear forces to look into the impact of these issues.

For more information, please see:

BBC News – Nine fired in US nuclear force cheating scandal – 27 March 2014

CNN – 9 Air Force commanders fired from jobs over nuclear missile test cheating – 27 March 2014

Fox News – Commanders fired in nuclear missile exam cheating scandal – 27 March 2014

Russia Today – Nine nuclear base commanders fired from US Air Force over cheating scandal 27 March 2014

The Washington Post – Nuke test cheating linked to flawed leadership – 27 March 2014

Houston Police Arrest Five Men for Kidnapping 115 Immigrants

by Michael Yoakum
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America

HOUSTON, United States – Police arrested five men on Tuesday, charging them with kidnapping 115 people at gunpoint and holding them in a small Houston area home.  The 115 people are suspected illegal immigrant, who were told by their captors that they must pay a ransom in order to continue their entry into the United States.  Sixteen of the 115 captors were minors.

Police found ninety-nine men and sixteen women in a 1300 square foot Houston area home last week. (photo courtesy of BBC News)

The five men – identified as Jose Aviles-Villa, Jonathan Solorzano-Tavila, Antonio Barruquet-Hildiberta, Jose Cesmas-Borja and Eugenio Sesmas-Borja – appeared before a federal judge Tuesday on hostage taking, weapons, and conspiracy charges.  The judge denied bail to all five suspects, believing them to be a flight risk for trial.

Conviction for the hostage taking charges could result in a 10 year sentence with a potential for 20 years for the conspiracy charges, plus fines.

A criminal complaint drafted by agents from the Department of Homeland Security claimed that agents found the 115 hostages in the Houston area home last week stripped of their shoes and most of their cloths.  The complaint said they were threatened with violence if they did not comply and there were instances of some being kicked and beaten and females being groped.

The captives told authorities that they were held under armed guard, the doors were locked with deadbolts, and the windows were covered with plywood to prevent their escape.  Authorities recovered a shotgun, rifle, stun gun, ammunition, and wooden paddle from the home.

Police found the 115 captives after a Chicago resident contacted Houston police about the possible abduction of her daughter.  The criminal complaint alleges that she paid $15,000 for the return of her daughter and two grandchildren.  After she paid the original ransom, the complaint claims the captors demanded an additional $13,000.

Houston police traced the phone call from the captors and began surveillance on the house, ultimately finding the captives.  Stash houses of more than one hundred captives are not rare in South Texas, but this was the largest in the city in several years.

For more information, please see:

ABC News – 5 Charged in Houston Human Smuggling Operation – 25 March 2014

BBC News – Five charged with holding 115 hostages in ‘stash’ house – 25 March 2014

The Guardian – Five men charged with hostage-taking after 115 people found in Texas house – 25 March 2014

Star Tribune – 5 charged in Houston human smuggling operation after more than 100 immigrants rescued – 25 March 2014

USA Today – Police find more than 100 immigrants in stash house – 20 March 2014