Explosive New Documents Reveal More Details of Bush-Era Torture, Including Prisoners Tortured to Death

Posted by Liliana Segura, AlterNet at 10:10 AM on February 13, 2009.

The more we learn, the uglier it gets.

Over 1,000 pages of government documents were released yesterday providing new details of the Bush administration's treatment of prisoners in the so-called "war on terror" Among other things, the documents reveal just how closely the Department of Defense collaborated with the CIA in its extrajudicial practices of indefinite detention and torture.

Released via FOIA requests, the paper trail includes confirmation of the existence of a previously "undisclosed detention facility" at Afghanistan's Bagram Air Base, as well as evidence that the DoD schemed to keep the Red Cross away from its detainees by holding off on registering their capture with the International Committee of the Red Cross for two weeks "to maximize intelligence collection."

Another salient and disturbing document includes correspondence sent to DoD transportation officials recommending that a set of Gitmo prisoners scheduled for released be detained for longer, due to fear of bad press.

In an e-mail sent to members of the Defense Department's Transportation Command (including Gen. Norton Schwartz, who is now the Air Force Chief of Staff) on February 17, 2006, an anonymous official -- the name was redacted -- wrote:

We may need to definitely think about checking with Southcom to see if we can hold off on return flights for 45 days or so until things die down. Otherwise we are likely to have hero's welcomes awaiting the detainees when they arrive … It would probably be preferable if we could deliver these detainees in something smaller and more discreet …"

The e-mail chain included a forwarded correspondence that read "US Getting Creamed on Human Rights" and which cited international coverage of the UN Rapporteurs' then-recent report on conditions at Guantanamo. That, "plus lingering interest in Abu Ghraib photos," read the e-mail, "adds up to the US taking a big hit on the issues of human rughts and respect for the rule of law."

The line fits neatly with the rest of what we know about the Bush administration's philosophy: that perceptions of abuse were worth worrying about; the abuse itself? Not so much.

"Proposing to hold men for a month and a half after they were deemed releasable is inexcusable," said Gitanjali Gutierrez, an attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights.

These documents, which are available on the CCR website, were released on the same day as another explosive set of documents obtained by the ACLU, which include a report by Vice Admiral Albert T. Church describing interrogations at Bagram as "clearly abusive, and clearly not in keeping with any approved interrogation policy or guidance."

The documents include papers relating to the investigation of two prisoners at Bagram:

"In both cases … [prisoners] were handcuffed to fixed objects above their heads in order to keep them awake."

"Additionally, interrogations in both incidents involved the use of physical violence, including kicking, beating, and the use of 'compliance blows' which involved striking the [prisoners] legs with the [interrogators] knees. In both cases, blunt force trauma to the legs was implicated in the deaths. In one case, a pulmonary embolism developed as a consequence of the blunt force trauma, and in the other case pre-existing coronary artery disease was complicated by the blunt force trauma."

 

Raw Story has more. For a summary of the ACLU documents, go here.

Tagged as: torture, guantanamo, foia, aclu, red cross, bagram

Liliana Segura is a staff writer and editor of AlterNet's Rights and Liberties and War on Iraq Special Coverage.