• Sheet of paper Report

USA: Turning a Page, but Torture Chapter is Far From Closed

December 9, 2014

We have said it before. We will say it again. What do we know about the secret detention programme operated by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) under authority granted by President George W. Bush on 17 September 2001?

  • We know that detainees in secret CIA custody were tortured. Torture is a crime under international law.
  • We know that detainees were subjected to enforced disappearance, also a crime under international law.
  • We know that no one has been prosecuted for authorizing or committing these crimes.

This is what Amnesty International wrote in August 2009 following release of a (heavily redacted) version of a CIA Inspector General’s 2004 report on the secret detention programme authorized as part of the USA’s response to the crime against humanity committed in the USA on 11 September 2001 (President Barack Obama “de-authorized” this programme in January 2009).