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The vice president’s remarks were only supported by lawmaker, Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama
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Vice
President Dick Cheney has appealed to Republican senators to allow CIA
exemptions to the ban on use of torture against what the U.S.
government calls “terror suspects”, participants in a closed-door
session have revealed.
Speaking at a regular weekly private meeting of Senate Republican
senators, Cheney claimed that the United States doesn't
use torture against detainees, however he said that exemption from
any legislation banning "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment is
needed to prevent a terrorist attacks, The Associated Press reported.
The Senate’s recently approved provision bans the "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment of detainees in U.S. custody.
"The vice president's office doesn't have any comment on a private
meeting with members of the Senate," Steve Schmidt, a spokesman for
Cheney, said.
The vice president’s remarks were only supported by lawmaker, Sen.
Jeff Sessions of Alabama. Arizona Sen. John McCain, the chief Senate
sponsor of an anti-torture provision that has twice cleared the Senate
and triggered veto threats from the White House, dissented, according
to officials.
McCain was tortured while in detention as a prisoner during the Vietnam War.
Analysts say that Cheney's appeal has undermined his role as White
House point man on the contentious issue as well as the importance the
administration attaches to it, specially that it is made at a time
where Congress tries to allay worldwide anger sparked by repetitive
abuse scandals and allegations that the U.S. uses torture as an
interrogation tactic in its detention centers.
In an interview with National Public Radio's "Morning Edition" on
Thursday, Lawrence Wilkerson, a former colonel who was Secretary of
State Colin Powell's chief of staff during President Bush's first term,
said that he had traced paperwork back to Cheney's office that he
believes led to U.S. troops abusing Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib jail.
"It was clear to me there that there was a visible audit trail from
the vice president's office through the secretary of defense down to
the commanders in the field," Wilkerson said, adding that view of
Cheney's office was put in "carefully couched" terms but that to a
soldier in the field it meant sometimes using interrogation techniques
that "were not in accordance with the spirit of the Geneva Conventions
and the law of war."
U.S. military personnel have routinely abused detainees, as part of
the military interrogation process or merely to “relieve stress.”
Most of the low-ranking officers who have been charged in the abuse
scandal said that they received orders from Military Intelligence
personnel as well as superior officers, challenging President Bush’s
claims that detainee abuses have been infrequent, exceptional and
unrelated to policy, according to Human Rights Watch .
Numerous Human rights groups voiced concern over the conditions of detainees held in U.S. custody.
Recently, the Human Rights Watch called on Bush’s
administration to appoint a special counsel to conduct a widespread
criminal investigation of military and civilian personnel, including
senior officials, who may been involved in abusing prisoners in U.S.
detention centers whether in Iraq, Afghanistan or Guantanamo, Bay,
Cuba.
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