Can U.S. Officials Torture Terrorists?
March 4, 2003 -- Now that the man believed to be al Qaeda's top strategist has been captured, U.S. agents trying to learn what is next in the terrorist organization's playbook have an array of interrogation techniques at their disposal — but torture is not among them.
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed is believed to have planned the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States and is blamed in other attacks that have killed at least 3,478 people over 10 years. In addition to 9/11, he is thought to have plotted the bombings of the USS Cole in Yemen, two U.S. embassies in Africa, a synagogue in Tunisia and a disco in Bali. His nephew planned the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center.
Initially, Mohammed refused to tell interrogators anything about future planned attacks, instead reciting the Koran to himself, U.S. officials told ABCNEWS. But officials now say Mohammed has begun giving out some information about new attacks in the planning stages — although it's not clear if he is being truthful.
According to Pakistani and U.S. officials, Mohammed became more inclined to cooperate after three days of unspecified rough treatment by Pakistani interrogators.
The capture of Mohammed has forced American officials to re-examine the United States' position on torture and whether such measures might be used to get him to talk about the al Qaeda terrorist network and its leader, Osama bin Laden.
Specifics of prisoner treatment are secret, but an intelligence official speaking to Congress said there was "before 9/11 and after 9/11 and after after,the gloves came off."
No Truth Serum, No Death Threats
Former CIA counterterrorism specialist Phil Giraldi said the United States permits CIA and FBI interrogators to use some unconventional procedures as they try to get inside a prisoner's head. Sleep deprivation, threats of torture and other techniques intended to confuse, frighten or wear down a captive can be used to an extent, Giraldi said.
Human rights advocates say there are limitations in both international and U.S. law when it comes to preventing prisoners from being tortured.
"What there is is a general definition that says intentional infliction of severe pain and suffering for the purpose of gaining information or a confession is prohibited," said Elisa Massmino of the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights.
U.S. law specifically bans the use of mind-altering drugs, such as the so-called truth serum, and it also prohibits death threats against prisoners or their family members.
Prolonged isolation and cigarette burns are generally considered to be outside the legal bounds, but there is a lot of ambiguity about what constitutes the infliction of "severe pain and suffering."
"The dividing line would seem to be that anything that is done to make you physically uncomfortable can be acceptable as long as it does not include what possibly could be described as physical abuse, like beating or electric shocks or something like that," Giraldi said today on ABCNEWS' Good Morning America.
"Some deprivation of food perhaps, perhaps the interrogation room being cold or too hot or something like that would be acceptable in terms of consensus on what this issue is," he said. Sensory deprivation and trickery are also common ways to squeeze information out of prisoners.
"You might lie to them about what you found on his computer, who you've arrested, what's happening in the outside world," said Stewart Baker, formerly a general counsel with the National Security Agency.
Different Rules in Different Countries
John Lindh, the so-called American Taliban, was strapped naked to a stretcher with duct tape and later kept inside a cold metal container in Afghanistan. His lawyers called it torture, but U.S. authorities said it was fair treatment in a war zone.
The U.N. Convention Against Torture, which went into effect in 1987, has ruled that interrogation might legitimately cost a prisoner sleep, but that sleep deprivation should not to used as a means to breaking a prisoner's will.
The convention, which had gained the consent of 128 of the 191 U.N. member states as of March 2002, requires governments to punish those who use torture within their territory or against their people. It also provides for measures to be taken in the prevention of torture and the rehabilitation of torture victims.
U.S. officials have said that violent torture isn't an option when it comes to getting information from terrorists, but what's often unclear is what is allowed to go on behind closed doors in countries such as Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Afghanistan and others where human rights groups say torture is practiced.
"We turn these people over to intelligence agencies that don't feel the same qualms about torture as we do," Baker said. It is not legal to take that measure with uncooperative prisoners, but it happens.
Using Kids as Leverage?
Sources have told ABCNEWS that Mohammed has been moved temporarily to a U.S. base in Afghanistan for questioning.
One possible wedge to pry information out of Mohammed could be his 7- and 9-year-old sons. Pakistani authorities detained the boys in a raid last September, and it's been suggested that the children could be used as a form of leverage, although their current whereabouts are unconfirmed.
After Mohammed's capture, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the United States doesn't sanction torture, but added that there are other ways in which to get most of the information needed. I
ABCNEWS' Jackie Judd and Brian Ross contributed to this report.