WASHINGTON: The administration of US President George W. Bush authorized the CIA to waterboard Al-Qaeda suspects according to two secret memos issued in 2003 and 2004, The Washington Post reported yesterday.
The memos were issued at the request of intelligence officials who were “troubled that White House policymakers had never endorsed the program in writing,” the newspaper said, citing four administration and intelligence officials familiar with the documents.
Waterboarding, a staple of brutal interrogations from the Spanish Inquisition to Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge regime, usually consists of strapping down a captive, covering his face with a cloth and pouring water onto the cloth to simulate drowning.
The CIA has admitted using the technique on Al-Qaeda suspects including alleged Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed following the 2001 attacks, at a time when further strikes on the US were believed to be imminent.
Rights groups have decried the technique as torture.
The White House, which has not previously acknowledged it was aware of the specific techniques being used by interrogators, has said the United States does not currently use waterboarding, but that it would not rule out the use of such techniques in the future.
