U.S. Senate releases report on CIA use of torture on detainees

The CIA downplayed the brutality of the interrogations and exaggerated the usefulness of the information it gathered, including its role in setting in motion the U.S. raid that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, said the Senate Intelligence Committee report. The 6,000-page report also found that the "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques" program escaped effective scrutiny by outsiders long after its inception in 2002, with CIA records showing then President George W. Bush was never fully briefed by the agency on torturous interrogation techniques until 2006. The report contained details about waterboarding, sexual threats and other controversial methods to obtain information, finding those techniques were largely ineffective and poorly managed, Xinhua reports. Some of the detainees were kept awake for up to 180 hours, or more than seven days, usually in standing or stress positions. Interrogators also placed the interrogations above medical needs, such as treating bullet wounds, the report said. Some detainees were also placed in ice water "baths". According to the report, interrogators told several detainees they would never be allowed to leave alive, and told one he would never go to court because "we can never let the world know what I have done to you." Conditions at CIA detention sites were poor, the report pointed out, saying detainees at a detention facility called "COBALT" were kept in complete darkness, and lack of heat at the facility likely contributed to the death of a detainee. The prisoners were also subjected to "rough takedowns," where approximately five CIA officers would scream at a detainee, drag him outside of his cell, cut his clothes off and secure him with Mylar tape. The detainee would then be hooded and dragged up and down a long corridor while being slapped and punched, the report said. Read more