Forgotten Horror: Obama Lets CIA Off Hook Over Criminal Torture Program

CIA Director George Tenet, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, Vice President Dick Cheney, and President George W. Bush should be investigated for creating, authorizing and implementing the CIA torture program, according to uman Rights Watch (HRW) report.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The US government has failed to prosecute the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), a year after a damning Senate report that found the US foreign intelligence service had used torture against detainees, an international rights group said in a report published Tuesday.

In its 153-page survey, Human Rights Watch (HRW) assessed the progress made in the US probe that implicated US officials and military officers in torture practices.

The rights pressure group rebutted arguments by the administration of US President Barack Obama that legal barriers made it impossible to pursue criminal cases.

It also argued there was enough physical evidence to support the opening of new inquiries into alleged criminal offenses by numerous US officials and CIA agents, including such felonies as torture, assault, sexual abuse, war crimes, and conspiracy to commit such crimes.

The group said that CIA Director George Tenet, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, Vice President Dick Cheney, and President George W. Bush should be investigated for creating, authorizing and implementing the CIA torture program.

In December 2014, the US Senate published a heavily redacted summary exposing the CIA's excessive interrogation techniques. The torture practices were applied in the period following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and continued through 2006.