UN torture envoy: US must prosecute Bush lawyers

[sabra]

Source: AP

VIENNA (AP) — The U.S. is obligated by a United Nations convention to prosecute Bush administration lawyers who allegedly drafted policies that approved the use of harsh interrogation tactics against terrorism suspects, the U.N.'s top anti-torture envoy said Friday.

Earlier this week, President Barack Obama left the door open to prosecuting Bush administration officials who devised the legal authority for gruesome terror-suspect interrogations. He had previously absolved CIA officers from prosecution.

Manfred Nowak, who serves as a U.N. special rapporteur in Geneva, said Washington is obligated under the U.N. Convention against Torture to prosecute U.S. Justice Department officials who wrote memos that defined torture in the narrowest way in order to justify and legitimize it, and who assured CIA officials that their use of questionable tactics was legal.

"That's exactly what I call complicity or participation" to torture as defined by the convention, Nowak said at a news conference. "At that time, every reasonable person would know that waterboarding, for instance, is torture."

Read more: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gTltgMKbsh8zQbZ0m3UarJ8QxAAAD97OTG5G0

[ixion]

1. waterboarding is NOT a "questionable tactic" it has been defined as TORTURE for more than a century

so I wish that stupid reporters would quit trying to obfuscate the truth.

[Tiggeroshii]

21. Isn't that their job?

Wait. It isn't?

:shrug:

[tomm2thumbs]

2. this is huge!!!!!!!!!!!!

thanks for posting

[SkyDaddy7]

3. Our President Set All This in MOTION..

...OK, I know no one wants be seen acting like the Republicans did with Bush as if he was perfect...5 years without one VETO. However, in the 1st 100 days how many campaign promises has President Obama made good on or set the ground work in oder to attempt to make good on? He appears to be squeaky clean nothing lingering in the background the Republicans could exploit. I think this is why the Republicans are going MAD, they gave no clue how to beat him politically. I will still have a critical eye on Obama as we should! But I also think the historic value of being the first African American President could be way overshadowed by his actual Presidency...I know it is way to early to say this but it just feels like something spacial is unfolding before our eyes!

OK, I am done with my daily cup of Obama Kool-Aid! BURP!

[peace13]

8. I have been going nuts since Obama and Rahm publicly

brushed these investigations aside. I will give it to you,it all seems to have worked out. I could read your post without cringing. Thanks for posting it. I worked like a dog for Obama. At times I may hold his feet to the fire but it is because I feel that this is our last chance to get it right. Peace, Kim

[SkyDaddy7]

10. Same here!

Mostly phone calls and turning in nunbers of registered voters here in Atlanta online...I am kinda restricted to my house due to stupid spinal cord injury but I tried to do what I could...And I think we should all hold his feet to the fire when needed. I think he wanted to get enough info out there to fire us up so that we set a bonfire under our congressional reps to do the right thing and the media!

There is an awesome post Frenchiecat (I think, hope I got the name right?)on the home page with media contacts. We should all use the info provided.

We asked for it so lets do it!!

[Vidar]

4. Good for the UN. Unfortunately, the US seldom even pays lip service.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

20. why do we have a UN? The USA has run roughshod over everyone

[Baby Snooks]

5. Obligated?

That's a word that seems to have escaped the attention of Barack Obama.

[AllyCat]

6. Come on Obama, lets do this now. You can say "your hands are tied"

and just prosecute these freaks already. The problem now is there are so many levels of this horror that it will tough to get it all done in 2 terms.

[Quantess]

7. The pressure is on!

[No Elephants]

9. Only the lawyers?

[Jackpine Radical]

13. Kind of a rewrite of Shakespeare--

First, prosecute all the lawyers...

[barbtries]

11. i'm sheltered from MSM

here on DU it seems like a tsunami is building toward prosecution. is it real?

[CrispyQ]

27. The media has changed the discourse from

"Did we torture?" to "Is torture effective?" It's abhorrent that this question is even being asked!

[barbtries]

28. eek

that just blows. wish i was surprised.

[williesgirl]

12. I'm so fucking tired of hearing Obama say he wants to move forward and not look back. He said it

again either earlier today or yesterday afternoon. We must uphold our Constitution and the Geneva Convention. Period. No matter how inconvenient it may be. rec'd

[pangaia]

14. street smarts

Maybe I am too optimistic, and who really knows..but-- I have this feeling that Obama knows exactly what he is doing. As I remember, at some point there was something FDR could not do politically. So he told 'the people- "make me do it." And they did, and he did it.
Maybe. just maybe, that is exactly what Obama is doing. This is one street smart dude. ( Boy am I glad he is OUR dude.)

[Stinger2]

15. BBC NEWS | Americas | US detainee death toll 'hits 108' in 2005, 93 % of the 779 Innocent!

BBC NEWS | Americas | US detainee death toll 'hits 108' in 2005
93 % of the 779 Innocent!

The AP found that of the 108 deaths in US custody:
At least 26 have been investigated as criminal homicide involving the abuse of prisoners
At least 29 are attributed to suspected natural causes or accidents
Twenty-two are blamed on an insurgent mortar attack on Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison in April 2004
At least 20 are attributed to "justifiable homicide", where investigations found US troops used deadly force appropriately - primarily against rioting, escaping or threatening prisoners.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4355779.stm


Torture, At least 93 percent of the 779 men and boys in -- were either completely innocent people

Another important point that this misses is that many of those who have been tortured were not terrorists, at least prior to being tortured. Andy Worthington has documented that "t least 93 percent of the 779 men and boys in -- were either completely innocent people, seized as a result of dubious intelligence or sold for bounty payments, or Taliban foot soldiers, recruited to fight an inter-Muslim civil war that began long before the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and that had nothing to do with al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden or international terrorism.”

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/40757

This was about Oil and attacking Iraq, that’s what makes this mess so wrong. Lie after Lie from outing a CIA agent to Yellow Cake, all lies by the Boys in Power that are above the Law. If anyone said anything against them the Fox Noise to Limbaugh would had crucified them. Fear was a large part of BushCo tool box that worked time and time again, now the roosters have come home to roost.

[EFerrari]

16. That's what he says. What he seems to do is release information

that moves this inquiry forward, as far as I can tell.

[CrispyQ]

29. My grandmother would call it 'sweeping it under the carpet."

We swept the Nixon mess under the carpet & here we are dealing with these same shitholes again, only they are behaving even worse! If we don't hold them accountable, they'll be back again. It will be a new generation, new faces, but they will be just as awful, maybe worse, once they've seen how much they can get away with.

"No matter how inconvenient it may be."

Hear, hear!

[MisterP]

17. bbbut, those lawyers are clean innocents: PERSECUTING them would be as UNCONSTITUTIONAL

as the torture itself!!! they only gave adviiiice! like Goebbels or Milosevic, or helped like doctors do
those "legal experts"--and forum posters--saying that giving unconstitutional advice is untouchable are clearly lickspittles for the same gang that conducted that torture and that "suggested" it
you can't prosecute a Mafia lawyer solely for being a mafia lawyer, but you can if they suggest the beating of a key witness...

[Towlie]

18. Just the lawyers? I'd sure hate to see Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, et al, get off free while they burn.

[npk]

19. PLEASE PLEASE. GO after the big fish.

I don't want to see a small group of fall guys going to some country club minimum security resort, while Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld walk. We must make sure everyone is prosecuted. That is everyone who broke the law.

[w4rma]

22. There are folks bigger than Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld, believe it or not. Much bigger.

Unfortunately, they kept their hands clean, for the most part, by using them as a buffer.

[npk]

24. Maybe. But something about those two (Cheney and Rumsfeld) smiling and laughing

really gets to me. I am sure that there are others who may or will fall through the cracks, but those two damn sure need to prosecuted.

[Thor_MN]

23. The GOP and the MSM seem frantic to make this a "Political" issue.

They know they have screwed the pooch and they are desperate to make this seem to be a witch hunt.

[Amonester]

25. it's a war criminals hunt

according to the U.N. Charter (and the Nuremberg Principles...)

no choice there, a person is either FOR them, or AGAINST them.

if that person is AGAINST them by not following their rules, they become accomplices of the crimes (of others...)

[HughMoran]

26. K&R

It's going to happen, I can just feel it.

Jail time for the bad boys.