What would we expect. CIA stands for, Clumsy Incompetent Asses.
But seriously, from the day I heard the hum of the Nixon tapes, I have
tracked about two tons of missing documents, files and tapes. Of
course we can't weigh the lost email that gets accidentally sent into
Outer Space. What is surprising, and speaks to the real incompetence
of our highly qualified officials, is the number of documents, emails,
files and tapes that have been left in place. I'd at least like to
think that the folks spying on me have a little class.
And by the way, Obama has slipped just a little bit more in my
opinion, after his dismal efforts to protect our American Way of Life.
American Way of Life...and that would be?...
Carl Jarvis
On 5/16/16, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > Whoops? CIA Watchdog 'Mistakenly' Destroys Its Sole Copy of Senate
Torture Report
________________________________________
Whoops? CIA Watchdog 'Mistakenly' Destroys Its Sole Copy of Senate Torture
Report
By Sarah Lazare [1] / AlterNet [2]
May 16, 2016
AddThis Sharing Buttons
Share to FacebookShare to TwitterShare to Google+More AddThis Share
optionsShare to Email
The years-long battle to force the Obama administration to release the
nearly-7,000-page Senate Intelligence Committee's report detailing the
CIA's
post-9/11 torture program just took an absurd new turn.
According to exclusive reporting [3] from Yahoo News correspondent Michael
Isikoff, the CIA inspector general's office says it "mistakenly" destroyed
its sole copy of the mass document "at the same time lawyers for the
Justice
Department were assuring a federal judge that copies of the document were
being preserved."
While the deleted report was not the only copy in existence, the foul-up is
already proving an embarrassment for the office, which is "responsible for
independent oversight of the CIA," according to [4] its materials.
Citing information obtained by "multiple intelligence community sources
familiar with the incident," Isikoff explains:
The incident was privately disclosed to the Senate Intelligence Committee
and the Justice Department last summer, the sources said. But the
destruction of a copy of the sensitive report has never been made public.
Nor was it reported to the federal judge who, at the time, was overseeing a
lawsuit seeking access to the still classified document under the Freedom
of
Information Act, according to a review of court files in the case.
.The deletion of the document has been portrayed by agency officials to
Senate investigators as an "inadvertent" foul-up by the inspector general.
In what one intelligence community source described as a series of errors
straight "out of the Keystone Cops," CIA inspector general officials
deleted
an uploaded computer file with the report and then accidentally destroyed a
disk that also contained the document, filled with thousands of secret
files
about the CIA's use of "enhanced" interrogation methods.
This is not the first time CIA evidence has gone missing. Isikoff notes:
Ironically in light of the inspector general's actions, the intelligence
committee's investigation was triggered by the CIA's admission in 2007 that
it had destroyed another key piece of evidence - hours of videotapes of the
waterboarding of two "high value" detainees, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim
al-Nashiri.
What's more, in 2014 the CIA hacked into [5] the computers used by the
Senate committee overseeing the report, but was later absolved [6] for the
breach by the inspector general's office.
Repeated queries from Yahoo News prompted Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein,
who oversaw the investigation, to write a letter [7] last Friday to CIA
director John Brennan requesting that he provide a copy of the report to
the
CIA inspector general "immediately."
"Your prompt response will allay my concern that this was more than an
'accident,'" she continued, adding: "I believe that it is important to
remedy this situation immediately."
According to [8] the ACLU, the torture report is the "most comprehensive
account of the torture program to date." The heavily redacted key findings
and executive summary of the investigation were released [9] to the public
at the end of 2014, revealing that the CIA repeatedly lied to the public
about the effectiveness of its brutal torture methods, which included forms
of assault referred to as "rectal feeding," as well as long-term sleep
deprivation and threats levied against the family members of those forced
to
undergo abuse.
Survivors of torture [10] and children who endured forced rendition have
repeatedly called [11] for the full release of the report, as well as
accountability for the atrocities brought to light. Yet the Obama
administration granted blanket immunity [12] to all Bush-era CIA torturers
and has vigorously fought against calls for transparency. Just days ago, a
court rejected an ACLU lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act
demanding the full release of the report-a decision the civil liberties
group intends to appeal.
"The CIA inspector general's 'inadvertent' destruction of this copy of the
full torture report is extremely disturbing and should have been reported
to
the court," Ashley Gorski, a staff attorney with the ACLU's National
Security Project, told AlterNet. The CIA's destruction of the report defies
Congress's intent, which is that the agency uses the study so that the
mistakes of the past are never repeated."
Yet, in remarks made last month, presumptive Republican nominee Donald
Trump
declared [13] he plans to escalate the CIA torture program. "They asked me,
What do you think about waterboarding, Mr. Trump? I said I love it. I love
it, I think it's great," he said. "And I said the only thing is, we should
make it much tougher than waterboarding, and if you don't think it works
folks, you're wrong."
Sarah Lazare is a staff writer for AlterNet. A former staff writer for
Common Dreams, she coedited the book About Face: Military Resisters Turn
Against War. Follow her on Twitter at @sarahlazare [14].
Share on Facebook Share
Share on Twitter Tweet
Report typos and corrections to 'corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx'. [15]
[16]
________________________________________
Source URL:
http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/whoops-cia-watchdog-mistakenly-destr
oys-its-sole-copy-senate-torture-report
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/sarah-lazare-0
[2] http://alternet.org
[3]
https://www.yahoo.com/news/senate-report-on-cia-torture-1429636113023030.htm
l?soc_src=social-sh&soc_trk=fb
[4] https://www.cia.gov/offices-of-cia/inspector-general
[5]
https://news.vice.com/article/the-google-search-that-made-the-cia-spy-on-the
-us-senate
[6]
https://www.cia.gov/news-information/press-releases-statements/2015-press-re
leases-statements/statements-on-agency-accountability-board-findings.html
[7]
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2834606-Feinstein-to-Brennan.html
[8] https://www.aclu.org/cases/senate-torture-report-foia
[9] https://www.amnestyusa.org/pdfs/sscistudy1.pdf
[10]
http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2014/04/03/cia-torture-victim-calls-dec
lassification-senate-report
[11]
http://www.reprieve.org.uk/press/cia-torture-report-a-good-start-but-child-v
ictims-of-rendition-absent/
[12]
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/aug/31/obama-justice-departmen
t-immunity-bush-cia-torturer
[13]
http://dailycaller.com/2016/04/20/trump-on-waterboarding-i-love-it-i-think-i
ts-great-video/
[14] https://twitter.com/sarahlazare
[15] mailto:corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=Typo on Whoops? CIA Watchdog
'Mistakenly' Destroys Its Sole Copy of Senate Torture Report
[16] http://www.alternet.org/
[17] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > Whoops? CIA Watchdog 'Mistakenly' Destroys Its Sole Copy of Senate
Torture Report
Whoops? CIA Watchdog 'Mistakenly' Destroys Its Sole Copy of Senate Torture
Report
By Sarah Lazare [1] / AlterNet [2]
May 16, 2016
AddThis Sharing ButtonsShare to FacebookShare to TwitterShare to
Google+More
AddThis Share optionsShare to Email
The years-long battle to force the Obama administration to release the
nearly-7,000-page Senate Intelligence Committee's report detailing the
CIA's
post-9/11 torture program just took an absurd new turn.
According to exclusive reporting [3] from Yahoo News correspondent Michael
Isikoff, the CIA inspector general's office says it "mistakenly" destroyed
its sole copy of the mass document "at the same time lawyers for the
Justice
Department were assuring a federal judge that copies of the document were
being preserved."
While the deleted report was not the only copy in existence, the foul-up is
already proving an embarrassment for the office, which is "responsible for
independent oversight of the CIA," according to [4] its materials.
Citing information obtained by "multiple intelligence community sources
familiar with the incident," Isikoff explains:
The incident was privately disclosed to the Senate Intelligence Committee
and the Justice Department last summer, the sources said. But the
destruction of a copy of the sensitive report has never been made public.
Nor was it reported to the federal judge who, at the time, was overseeing a
lawsuit seeking access to the still classified document under the Freedom
of
Information Act, according to a review of court files in the case.
.The deletion of the document has been portrayed by agency officials to
Senate investigators as an "inadvertent" foul-up by the inspector general.
In what one intelligence community source described as a series of errors
straight "out of the Keystone Cops," CIA inspector general officials
deleted
an uploaded computer file with the report and then accidentally destroyed a
disk that also contained the document, filled with thousands of secret
files
about the CIA's use of "enhanced" interrogation methods.
This is not the first time CIA evidence has gone missing. Isikoff notes:
Ironically in light of the inspector general's actions, the intelligence
committee's investigation was triggered by the CIA's admission in 2007 that
it had destroyed another key piece of evidence - hours of videotapes of the
waterboarding of two "high value" detainees, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim
al-Nashiri.
What's more, in 2014 the CIA hacked into [5] the computers used by the
Senate committee overseeing the report, but was later absolved [6] for the
breach by the inspector general's office.
Repeated queries from Yahoo News prompted Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein,
who oversaw the investigation, to write a letter [7] last Friday to CIA
director John Brennan requesting that he provide a copy of the report to
the
CIA inspector general "immediately."
"Your prompt response will allay my concern that this was more than an
'accident,'" she continued, adding: "I believe that it is important to
remedy this situation immediately."
According to [8] the ACLU, the torture report is the "most comprehensive
account of the torture program to date." The heavily redacted key findings
and executive summary of the investigation were released [9] to the public
at the end of 2014, revealing that the CIA repeatedly lied to the public
about the effectiveness of its brutal torture methods, which included forms
of assault referred to as "rectal feeding," as well as long-term sleep
deprivation and threats levied against the family members of those forced
to
undergo abuse.
Survivors of torture [10] and children who endured forced rendition have
repeatedly called [11] for the full release of the report, as well as
accountability for the atrocities brought to light. Yet the Obama
administration granted blanket immunity [12] to all Bush-era CIA torturers
and has vigorously fought against calls for transparency. Just days ago, a
court rejected an ACLU lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act
demanding the full release of the report-a decision the civil liberties
group intends to appeal.
"The CIA inspector general's 'inadvertent' destruction of this copy of the
full torture report is extremely disturbing and should have been reported
to
the court," Ashley Gorski, a staff attorney with the ACLU's National
Security Project, told AlterNet. The CIA's destruction of the report defies
Congress's intent, which is that the agency uses the study so that the
mistakes of the past are never repeated."
Yet, in remarks made last month, presumptive Republican nominee Donald
Trump
declared [13] he plans to escalate the CIA torture program. "They asked me,
What do you think about waterboarding, Mr. Trump? I said I love it. I love
it, I think it's great," he said. "And I said the only thing is, we should
make it much tougher than waterboarding, and if you don't think it works
folks, you're wrong."
Sarah Lazare is a staff writer for AlterNet. A former staff writer for
Common Dreams, she coedited the book About Face: Military Resisters Turn
Against War. Follow her on Twitter at @sarahlazare [14].
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Report typos and corrections to 'corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx'. [15]
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.[16]
Source URL:
http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/whoops-cia-watchdog-mistakenly-destr
oys-its-sole-copy-senate-torture-report
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/sarah-lazare-0
[2] http://alternet.org
[3]
https://www.yahoo.com/news/senate-report-on-cia-torture-1429636113023030.htm
l?soc_src=social-sh&soc_trk=fb
[4] https://www.cia.gov/offices-of-cia/inspector-general
[5]
https://news.vice.com/article/the-google-search-that-made-the-cia-spy-on-the
-us-senate
[6]
https://www.cia.gov/news-information/press-releases-statements/2015-press-re
leases-statements/statements-on-agency-accountability-board-findings.html
[7]
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2834606-Feinstein-to-Brennan.html
[8] https://www.aclu.org/cases/senate-torture-report-foia
[9] https://www.amnestyusa.org/pdfs/sscistudy1.pdf
[10]
http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2014/04/03/cia-torture-victim-calls-dec
lassification-senate-report
[11]
http://www.reprieve.org.uk/press/cia-torture-report-a-good-start-but-child-v
ictims-of-rendition-absent/
[12]
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/aug/31/obama-justice-departmen
t-immunity-bush-cia-torturer
[13]
http://dailycaller.com/2016/04/20/trump-on-waterboarding-i-love-it-i-think-i
ts-great-video/
[14] https://twitter.com/sarahlazare
[15] mailto:corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=Typo on Whoops? CIA Watchdog
'Mistakenly' Destroys Its Sole Copy of Senate Torture Report
[16] http://www.alternet.org/
[17] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
