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FBI warned military about Guantanamo tactics
Associated Press
Published February 24, 2006
WASHINGTON - FBI agents repeatedly warned military interrogators at the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, that their aggressive methods were legally risky and also likely to be ineffective, according to FBI memos made public Thursday.
A senior officer at the prison for terror suspects also "blatantly misled" his superiors at the Pentagon into thinking the FBI had endorsed the "aggressive and controversial interrogation plan" for one detainee, according to one of the 54 memos released by the American Civil Liberties Union.
The memos had been previously released, but in more heavily censored form, as part of an ACLU lawsuit under the federal Freedom of Information Act.
FBI officials, whose names were blacked out, indicated that senior military officials, including former Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, were aware of and sometimes approved of putting hoods on prisoners, threatening them with violence and subjecting them to humiliating treatment.
A spokeswoman for Wolfowitz, now president of the World Bank, did not respond to a request for comment Thursday.
Agents on assignment at the U.S. Navy facility in Cuba brought their concerns to the prison's commander, Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, and laid them out in detailed messages to top FBI officials.
One memo from May 2003 describes tension between the FBI agents and their military counterparts over "aggressive interrogation tactics in GTMO which are of questionable effectiveness and subject to uncertain interpretation based on law and regulation."
Judge orders release of detainee information
A federal judge ordered the Pentagon to release the identities of hundreds of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, a move that could force the government to reveal the names of those imprisoned there.
U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff in New York ordered the Defense Department to release uncensored transcripts of detainee hearings, which contain the names of detainees in custody and those who have been held and later released.
[Last modified February 24, 2006, 01:42:09]
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