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Report Details Pentagon Role in Torture Tactics

Opponents of last week’s release of memos detailing CIA interrogation techniques argue that they will provide enemies of the United States with a training manual to prepare their operatives for capture. The irony is that the U.S. military appears to have done the exact opposite, taking a training program that had been designed to prepare American soldiers to withstand torture by communist regimes seeking to extract false confessions and twisting it into a highly controversial interrogation manual.

Did Waterboarding Prevent Terrorism Attacks?

In the wake of the release of the CIA torture memos, the Obama Administration already has its hands full with critics on the left who want senior Bush Administration officials prosecuted for the use of harsh interrogation techniques like water boarding. But thanks to former Vice President Dick Cheney, it has to deal with a different line of attack from the right. The growing chorus claims the Administration selectively chose which CIA memos to declassify, deliberately holding back documents that show “the success of the effort…specifically what we gained as a result of this activity,” as Cheney put it in an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity Monday.

Scientists Claim CIA Misused Work on Sleep Deprivation

German and French researchers whose work has been cited by the CIA and the Justice Department to help justify the legality of harsh interrogation techniques, including prolonged sleep deprivation, condemned the Bush Administration on Tuesday for misusing their scientific findings. “It is total nonsense to cite our study in this context,” said Dr.

Obama leaves door open to Bush officials’ prosecution

President Obama on Tuesday left open the possibility of criminal prosecution for Bush administration officials who drew up the legal basis for interrogation techniques that many view as torture. Obama said it will be up to Attorney General Eric Holder to decide whether or not to prosecute the former officials. “With respect to those who formulated those legal decisions, I would say that is going to be more a decision for the attorney general within the parameter of various laws, and I don’t want to prejudge that,” Obama said during a meeting with Jordan’s King Abdullah at the White House.

Nazi victim: Can people without a soul be punished?

For 65 years, Elisabeth Mann has carried with her the pain only a Holocaust survivor can know. The only one in her Hungarian Jewish family to make it out of the Nazi death camps, life for a long time felt like punishment

Why Did Ahmadinejad Help American Journalist Roxana Saberi?

In a surprising gesture of white knighthood, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came to the aid of Roxana Saberi, the Iranian-American journalist detained in a Tehran prison on spying charges.

Administration to release Bush-era interrogation memos

The Obama administration will release four Bush-era memos on terror interrogations Thursday, according to a senior administration official. The administration also informed CIA officials they will not be prosecuted for past waterboarding and other harsh interrogation tactics, the official also confirms. The memos, written by a top Justice Department lawyer, provided legal guidance to the entire executive branch, including the intelligence agencies, on permissible “enhanced interrogation techniques” that could be used against suspected terrorists taken into custody.

African villages denounce female circumcision

Ten villages in western Niger have publicly denounced the practice of female genital mutilation, according to a UNICEF report. The FIA Court of Appeal said that the rear diffusers used by the Brawn, Williams and Toyota teams “comply with the applicable regulations.” The FIA panel sat for eight hours in Paris on Tuesday to hear evidence and their decision backs up a decision by the stewards at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix that the controversial aerodynamic devices were within the rules

Brawn GP win F1 legal battle over diffusers

Jenson Button’s wins in the opening two races of the Formula One season will stand after motorsport chiefs ruled on Wednesday that the aerodynamic diffuser ftited to the rear of his Brawn GP car is legal. The FIA Court of Appeal said that the rear diffusers used by the Brawn, Williams and Toyota teams “comply with the applicable regulations.” The FIA panel sat for eight hours in Paris on Tuesday to hear evidence and their decision backs up a decision by the stewards at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix that the controversial aerodynamic devices were within the rules

UNICEF ‘deeply concerned’ about marriage of 8-year-old

The head of the U.N.