Bush threatens to veto anti-torture Bill
London Telegraph | December 16, 2007
By Alex Spillius
President George W Bush has threatened to veto a Bill that bans the CIA from using waterboarding, mock executions and other harsh interrogation methods that the White House has permitted during the war on terror.
The Bill was passed late on Thursday by the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives and now makes its way to the Senate, where it is likely to be passed.
It tackles one of major controversies of the Bush administration: the use on terror suspects of waterboarding, a harsh form of interrogation that involves strapping down a prisoner, covering his mouth with plastic or cloth and pouring water over his face. The prisoner quickly begins to inhale water, causing the sensation of drowning.
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The CIA has admitted using the practice three times since the September 11 attacks on America, but the agency's director Michael Hayden said he banned it in 2006.
A former CIA officer involved in the questioning of Abu Zubaydah, a senior al-Qa'eda operative, said this week that the use of waterboarding on the prisoner had proved highly effective in gleaning information, though the officer did consider it a form of torture.
The Bush administration remains opposed to restrictions on harsh interrogation methods, despite the fact they have been disavowed by the military, which in 2006 outlawed not only waterboarding, but sexually humiliating prisoners, placing hoods over their heads, threatening them with dogs, conducting mock executions or depriving them of food and water. The restrictions were imposed after the abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2004.
If the president vetoes the Bill, it would be another defeat for the Democrats in Congress. They swept to power in November 2006 confident that they would be able to set the agenda for the remainder of the Bush years.
Instead they have lost almost every significant battle, thanks chiefly to Mr Bush's intransigence and the Democrats' majority of two in the Senate, where they have failed to get legislation passed or to muster the two-thirds majority required to overturn a presidential veto.
This week it became clear that the Democrats, led by Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker, would not be able to make further funding for Iraq conditional on Mr Bush accepting a vague deadline to bring troops home.
The president will receive approximately $75 billion for the war - less than the $196 billion he wanted - but with no strings attached. He is likely to get his way next time he comes asking Congress for money for the conflict.
