Secret U.S. Endorsement of Severe Interrogations
From the New York Times
Excerpt: When the Justice Department publicly declared torture “abhorrent” in a legal opinion in December 2004, the Bush administration appeared to have abandoned its assertion of nearly unlimited presidential authority to order brutal interrogations.

But soon after Alberto R. Gonzales’s arrival as attorney general in February 2005, the Justice Department issued another opinion, this one in secret. It was a very different document, according to officials briefed on it, an expansive endorsement of the harshest interrogation techniques ever used by the Central Intelligence Agency.

The new opinion, the officials said, for the first time provided explicit authorization to barrage terror suspects with a combination of painful physical and psychological tactics, including head-slapping, simulated drowning and frigid temperatures.

Mr. Gonzales approved the legal memorandum on "combined effects" over the objections of James B. Comey, the deputy attorney general, who was leaving his job after bruising clashes with the White House. Disagreeing with what he viewed as the opinion’s overreaching legal reasoning, Mr. Comey told colleagues at the department that they would all be "ashamed" when the world eventually learned of it. More

Labels: Alberto Gonzales, CIA, secrecy, torture

Fired Attorney was Investigating CIA Corruption
From US News & World Report
Excerpt: On May 11, 2006, Kyle Sampson, then chief of staff to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, sent a confidential E-mail to the White House counsel's office regarding the "removal and replacement" of U.S. attorneys whose four-year terms had expired, including the U.S. attorney in San Diego, Carol Lam: "The real problem we have right now with Carol Lam," Sampson wrote, "that leads me to conclude that we should have someone ready to be nominated on 11/18, the day her 4-year term expires."

So what was the "real problem" that Sampson thought the administration had with Lam?

U.S. News has learned that on May 10, one day before Sampson's E-mail to the White House counsel's office, the U.S. attorney's office in San Diego alerted the Justice Department that the FBI would execute search warrants in two days for the No. 3 official at the CIA, Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, in connection with the spiraling corruption probe into former Republican Rep. Randall "Duke" Cunningham of California.

Now Democratic members of Congress want to know whether that alert triggered Sampson's E-mail and whether Lam's firing and those of seven other federal prosecutors were politically motivated. Sampson's E-mail, sent one day after the alert, raises serious questions as to whether the CIA tried to intervene in a politically charged investigation and tried to get Lam fired. More

Labels: Alberto Gonzales, CIA, corruption

CIA Disbands Unit Set Up to Hunt for Bin Laden
From Reuters via ABC News
Excerpt: The CIA has disbanded a unit set up in the 1990s to oversee the spy agency's hunt for Osama bin Laden and transferred its duties to broader operations that track Islamist militant groups, a U.S. intelligence official said on Tuesday.

The bin Laden unit, codenamed Alec Station, became less valuable as a separate operation as counterterrorism operations eliminated top al Qaeda operatives and the movement's focus shifted more to regional networks of militants, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.


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Labels: agency, bin Laden, CIA

Judge dismisses Masri torture case
From ABC News
Excerpt: A U.S. judge dismissed on Thursday a lawsuit against former CIA Director George Tenet and several CIA employees by a German of Lebanese origin who says he was abducted and tortured by the American spy agency.
U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis agreed with government arguments that moving forward with Khaled el-Masri's case would risk national security by exposing state secrets about CIA activities vital to the U.S. war on terrorism. ...

...Ellis said the government provided documents to him that showed "damage to the national security could result if the defendants in this case were required to admit or deny el-Masri's allegations."...

...Masri said Macedonian authorities abducted him on December 31, 2003, and he was held prisoner in a Skopje hotel room for 23 days and beaten, stripped and sodomized.
He said he was then taken by members of a CIA 'black renditions' team and flown by the CIA to Afghanistan, where he was held as a terrorism suspect. Masri said he was beaten in Afghanistan and went on a hunger strike to protest his confinement. On May 28, 2004, Masri was flown to Albania where he was dumped on the side of an abandoned road.
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Labels: CIA, prisoner, torture

Cheney Plan Exempts CIA From Bill Barring Abuse of Detainees
From the Washington Post
Excerpt: The Bush administration has proposed exempting employees of the Central Intelligence Agency from a legislative measure endorsed earlier this month by 90 members of the Senate that would bar cruel and degrading treatment of any prisoners in U.S. custody. The proposal, which two sources said Vice President Cheney handed last Thursday to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) in the company of CIA Director Porter J. Goss, states that the measure barring inhumane treatment shall not apply to counterterrorism operations conducted abroad or to operations conducted by "an element of the United States government" other than the Defense Department. ...
... The provision in question ... essentially proscribes harsh treatment of any detainees in U.S. custody or control anywhere in the world. It was specifically drafted to close what its backers say is a loophole in the administration's policy of generally barring torture, namely its legal contention that these constraints do not apply to treatment of foreigners on foreign soil.
Cheney Plan Exempts CIA From Bill Barring Abuse of Detainees

Labels: cheney, CIA, prisoner, torture

CIA team traveled Italy in style
From the Chicago Tribune
Excerpt: When the CIA decides to "render" a terrorism suspect living abroad for interrogation in Egypt or another friendly Middle East nation, it spares no expense.
...
First to arrive in Milan was the surveillance team, and the hotels they chose were among the best Europe has to offer. Especially popular was the gilt-and-crystal Principe di Savoia, with acres of burnished wood paneling and plush carpets, where a single room costs $588 a night, a club sandwich goes for $28.75 and a Diet Coke adds another $9.35.

According to hotel records obtained by the Milan police investigating Abu Omar's disappearance, two CIA operatives managed to ring up more than $9,000 in room charges alone. The CIA's bill at the Principe for seven operatives came to $39,995, not counting meals, parking and other hotel services.

Another group of seven operatives spent $40,098 on room charges at the Westin Palace, a five-star hotel across the Piazza della Repubblica from the Principe, where a club sandwich is only $20.

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Also see:

Covert CIA program is expanding despite furor
From the Houston Chronicle

Labels: agency, CIA, spending

CIA Director Cuts Meeting on Terrorism
From the Washington Post
Excerpt: The daily 5 o'clock meeting at CIA headquarters that for the past three years has coordinated tactical counterterrorism operations involving senior CIA, FBI, Pentagon and Homeland Security Department officials has been cut back by new CIA Director Porter J. Goss to three a week, according to current and former administration and intelligence officials...
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Labels: CIA, FBI, national security, pentagon