Loading...
post-template-default single single-post postid-3085 single-format-standard

CIA Torture Report How the World’s Media Reacted

Alex Constantine - January 5, 2015

The US Central Intelligence Agency’s use of torture was reported widely on front pages around the world on Wednesday.

A milestone report by the Senate intelligence committee revealed that the use of torture in secret prisons run by the CIA was even more extreme than previously exposed, and included “rectal rehydration” and “rectal feeding”, sleep deprivation lasting almost a week and threats to the families of the detainees.

Here’s how the world’s media responded to the report.

In the US

The New York Times called the report “a portrait of depravity that is hard to comprehend and even harder to stomach”. But, in its editorial, the Times emphasised that no one was ever likely to be held accountable for these acts.

The litany of brutality, lawlessness and lack of accountability serves as a reminder of what a horrible decision President Obama made at the outset of his administration to close the books on this chapter in our history, even as he repudiated the use of torture. The CIA officials who destroyed videotapes of waterboarding were left unpunished, and all attempts at bringing these acts into a courtroom were blocked by claims of national secrets.

It is hard to believe that anything will be done now.

The Washington Post was similarly emphatic in its own editorial, following graphic details of treatment meted out to detainees in CIA custody with a clear:

“This is not how Americans should behave. Ever.”

The editorial concludes:

We don’t discount warnings that releasing the report might rouse anti-American sentiment in the near term. But in the long term, the United States will benefit by demonstrating a commitment to transparency and self-criticism — and, most of all, by pledging never to repeat its post-9/11 mistakes.

The LA Times described attempts by “Republicans in Congress and many in the national-security bureaucracy” to bottle up the intelligence committee’s conclusions as “scandalous”. It gave short shrift to the suggestion made by some Republicans that the report would increase the chance of terrorist attacks on America, pointing this out to be “an argument that could be used to justify suppressing the information forever”.

USA Today was more circumspect on torture, its editorial claiming “the degree to which the CIA program gained useful information from terrorists is destined to be debated for some time”. It quoted liberally from Senator John McCain, himself a victim of torture in Vietnam, who told the Senate:

This question isn’t about our enemies; it’s about us. It’s about who we were, who we are and who we aspire to be… Our enemies act without conscience. We must not.

5104ac3f 2c8c 45df b305 1e9381df056f 620x510 - CIA Torture Report New York Times Photograph: NYT5b3c4dca 2fea 491e b5dd 16350d5354d9 439x540 - CIA Torture Report San Francisco Chronicle Photograph: SF Chronicle35960b5d a0f5 4f15 bcf6 2355121e5cac 620x483 - CIA Torture Report Washington Post website Photograph: Washington Post542cc757 735b 4ff5 9fbf 506105c41bba 589x1020 - CIA Torture Report Washington Post newspaper Photograph: Washington Post05436775 f752 4047 9174 ea3c7dc5eb96 470x600 - CIA Torture Report Baltimore Sun Photograph: Baltimore Sun 90402dab 6f3a 4c9e 8b7f 4ae32d2123db bestSizeAvailable - CIA Torture Report USA Today Photograph: USA Today

In the UK

The Times emphasied the impact of the report on the CIA despite the fact that many of its conclusions “had been trailed long in advance”.

The CIA depicted here is the rogue agency of Hollywood fiction, writing its own rules, hoodwinking its paymasters and betraying the values for which America purports to stand. The agency has prepared a furious point-by-point rebuttal, but it would do well to take the bulk of this broadside on the chin.

The Independent followed the Times in its accusation that America chose to “forfeit the moral high ground” after 9/11.

We have known the ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ such as waterboarding constituted torture. Now the committee has confirmed it. This is not just a breach of the solemn and absolute prohibition of torture to which the US has committed itself in international treaties: it is a terrible political and moral mistake.

The Telegraph said that what was more alarming is that those responsible “sought to conceal the truth about their activities from American policymakers and the public. Even the White House ... was kept in the dark as to the extent of the programme.”

aa88d5cd 7f31 4aaf b051 cac14a226dea 620x472 - CIA Torture Report The Times website Photograph: The Timesd294c602 85d8 417e 925f 9df15c7d2c24 645x720 - CIA Torture Report The Times newspaper Photograph: The Timesb6990d1d 02cc 4989 9b28 b390918af82d 545x720 - CIA Torture Report The Daily Mail Photograph: Associated Newspapers1fed2372 819e 4579 bb87 e5a1fb6e817b 549x720 - CIA Torture Report The Independent Photograph: The Independent27f9fdd5 c717 4177 8b58 9a62c96a13de 556x720 - CIA Torture Report The Daily Telegraph Photograph: The Telegraph

Around the world

The story also ran on the front pages of newspapers around the world including Spain’s El Pais, Germany’s Das Bild, Belgium’s DeMorgen, Australia’s Sydney Morning Herald, Saudi Arabia’s Arab News, The Times of India, Poland’s Gazeta, Buenos Aires Herald and Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post.

5cbb160e 29dc 4e39 8cbf ecdaad5b7f23 560x720 - CIA Torture Report Kleine Zeitung, Germany: ‘America’s shame’ Photograph: Kleine Zeitung78e35a44 33fd 42b4 9579 7bf33a4da94c 491x720 - CIA Torture Report DeMorgen, Belgium: ‘Torture report devastating for CIA’ Photograph: DeMorgen69489b28 3ad8 4ce7 91f5 e174849a164d 611x720 - CIA Torture Report Arab News, Saudi Arabia: ‘CIA torture “brutal, ineffective”’ Photograph: Arab News07ba9728 61ba 4f63 9814 a8edd039c809 620x485 - CIA Torture Report Gazeta, Poland: ‘CIA tortured and lied’ Photograph: Gazetabf2bc7ba 9069 4308 b99b fe4217946072 636x660 - CIA Torture Report Buenos Aires Herald: ‘Official report exposes CIA brutality’ Photograph: Buenos Aires Heraldcfa58eb9 5801 4020 901a 464b9a1908e0 620x485 - CIA Torture Report Times of India: ‘CIA “torture” report out; agency accused of lying, brutality’ Photograph: Times of Indiac1d11da0 f0a3 40a1 b9ab 75afee77fb86 620x417 - CIA Torture Report

In Poland

Poland’s former president Aleksander Kwasniewski has confirmed for the first time that his country hosted one of the CIA’s “black sites”, but says he did not authorise the brutal treatment of inmates. He said American officials told him the site would be used to gain information from sources “who had expressed willingness to cooperate” and that George W Bush insisted the agency’s methods provided “important benefits in security matters”.

Poland allowed the CIA to hold terror suspects on its soil on the condition they were treated in accordance with Polish law, he said, adding that the US never signed the memorandum agreeing to this. He said those who broke international laws prohibiting torture should be prosecuted.

Kwasniewski claims to have put pressure on Bush about CIA interrogation in Poland in a meeting at the White House in 2003. “I told Bush that this cooperation must end and it did end,” Kwasniewski said. “The Americans conducted their activities in such secrecy that it raised our concern.”

He defended cooperation with the US after the September 11 attacks, saying his administration had calculated Washington would return the favour. Explaining why he chose to work closely with the CIA, he said: “There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

He added that the publication of the Senate report was a breach of trust because Poland had believed details of its partnership with the CIA would remain secret.

“The report shows that one needs to work with this most important, biggest ally on the basis of limited trust, but trust nonetheless,” he said.

In Lithuania

The Lithuanian prime minister, Algirdas Butkevicius, urged Washington to say whether the country housed one of the bases where the CIA tortured prisoners.

Although Lithuania was not named in the heavily redacted report, the description of “detention centre Violet” is consistent with a 2009-10 Lithuanian parliament investigation, which found that the CIA had set up and run premises that could have been used as a detention centre near the capital, Vilnius. At the time, the report could not determine whether the site was used to house prisoners because US officials refused to cooperate.

Butkevicius said he hoped parliament would reopen the investigation and the US would share the full report, or at least an unredacted version of Tuesday’s 600-page summary.

Abu Zubaydah, a Saudi now held at Guantánamo Bay, says he was kept in the secret CIA site in Lithuania and has called on the European court of human rights to rule that Lithuania acted illegally.

However, Lithuania’s former president Valdas Adamkus told the local BNS news service: “Until I see documents before my eyes about someone secretly bringing prisoners into Lithuania, I will stick to my position that there were no prisons or prisoners in Lithuania.”

---------------------------

USA TODAY REPORTS ...

Voices: Worldwide fallout from CIA torture report

Sherry Ricchiardi, Special for USA TODAY
December 22, 2014

(Photo: John Moore, AP)

For two decades, I have worked in countries where government torture was part of the landscape. To the oppressed, America was a beacon for human rights.

But after the Sept. 11 attacks, there was a sea change.

I was headed to Sanaa, Yemen, to lead workshops for local journalists as CBS andThe New Yorker broke the story of torture at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison in April 2004. Pictures of American soldiers brutalizing naked Muslim detainees filled the airwaves.

The workshop participants — 27 men and three women — vented disgust at the United States for allowing tactics they despised in their own country. A band of renegade soldiers drew outrage throughout the Islamic world.

Abu Ghraib tarnished America's reputation. The Dec. 9, 2014, report by the Senate Intelligence Committee dealt it a devastating blow.

635537180584681348 GTY 460192564 - CIA Torture Report

Senate report reopens battle over CIA interrogations

The Senate investigation confirmed that torture and deceit were part of the CIA's modus operandi. The sordid details turned stomachs and left America's adversaries smirking over the blatant double standard.

China, North Korea, Iran and the Islamic State — all serial torturers — were quick to point out that America had lost the moral high ground. The Chinese news agencyXinhua suggested the United States "clean up its own backyard" before preaching human rights to other countries.

This breakdown in moral authority has a powerful impact on all of us who operate overseas. For me, the difficult part will be explaining how a policy of torture and abuse happened in the first place.

I have heard chilling accounts from foreign journalists about going to jail and being threatened by their governments or extremists. I worry that the CIA torture report will embolden their tormentors.

In Iran, a journalist could not imagine exposing government secrets without suffering dire consequences. In Yemen, a reporter asked if the authors of the Abu Ghraib stories would go to prison and their news media organizations would be shut down. ...

Some Reader Comments

  • Hue Hendricks ·  Top Commenter · Bowling Green State University
    Next. Bush. Cheney. Rumsfield brought up on charges for war crimes. Sad that the Bush regime continues to tarnish this great nation. Justice needs to be served and these criminals put to trial.
  • The Bush family has destroyed our perception in the world. Unfortunately, our own policies are a reason for the direct hatred of American in the Arab world. Operations just cause then the first Iraq war. In our own denial, we have created imperial terror. In Bush's first war the death toll in Iraq was estimated 150,000 and 79 Americans. Jr.'s war was 2million and 90% civilians by estimation on top of Afghanistan. So what's next round 3 good ole Jeb. It is time for accountability and prosecution of our domestic terrorists. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfield are a good start. They have neither made us any safer or any more free. They turned war into a for profit globalized corporation and have reaped erroneous riches from it. Which are free to them because 56 cents of every tax dollar pays for it. Tax dollars that they don't pay and if they did it would be from profits reaped from tax payer money regardless.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *