After denying for months the existence of secret prisons in Eastern Europe where terrorist suspects are flown for "interrogation", President George W. Bush has finally come clean and admitted that, yes, the CIA does fly prisoners to secret prisons, where they are held for months or years without being charged with any crime.
But it is okay, they aren't being tortured. The CIA interrogators who observe the "tough" interrogation techniques have promised, cross their hearts and hope somebody else gets in trouble, that no torture is being used. It can't be torture, right, because we're the good guys, and good guys would never use torture.
Right?
One interesting tidbit of information, from the sidebar of the report:
Guantanamo by the Numbers
Since 2002, the United States military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has been holding prisoners from the invasion of Afghanistan and the war on terrorism.
There are 459 prisoners remaining at Guantanamo; 315 have either been transferred to the custody of their home governments or released.
[...] 120 detainees have been determined either not to be enemy combatants or to no longer be threats to the United States and its allies. However, they are still being held at Guantanamo because the United States fears they may be persecuted upon their return home; the United States can't get guarantee that they won't be released once they're returned home; or their home governments don't want them.
Let me get this straight -- these people are no threat, have committed no crime, but the US won't release them because:
- their home government might jail them for no reason
- their home government might not jail them for no reason
- their home government just doesn't want them
Kafka would love this "war".
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