CIA – News Stories About CIA - Page 36

Oct 5, 2007 3:19 AM CDT

Dems Demand Torture Memos

Anger erupts over secret approval for extreme interrogation techniques

(Newser) - The disclosure by the New York Times of secret Justice Department memos greenlighting the use of torture techniques on terror suspects has triggered an uproar on Capitol Hill. Democrats have demanded to see the memos, which authorized head-slapping, sleep deprivation, freezing, a near-drowning technique called water boarding and other painful...

Justice Memos Endorse Torture

Oct 4, 2007 9:56 AM CDT

Justice Memos Endorse Torture

Officials gave green light for array of painful interrogation techniques

(Newser) - The Justice Department under Alberto Gonzales secretly endorsed the use of torture techniques during interrogation by the CIA, the New York Times reports. A classified 2005 legal memorandum authorized the harshest techniques ever used by the CIA, the Times says, including a combination of head-slapping, waterboarding, sleep deprivation, freezing, loud...

CIA Suspects Granted
Access to Lawyers

Sep 28, 2007 3:51 AM CDT

CIA Suspects Granted Access to Lawyers

'High value' detainees include 911 'mastermind'

(Newser) - US officials have granted 14 "high-value" al-Qaeda suspects, transferred to Guantanamo Bay after years in secret CIA prisons, access to lawyers to represent them at future military trials. The suspects include Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 911 attacks, and others once close to Osama bin Laden,...

Prez Yanks Pick for Top CIA Lawyer

Sep 26, 2007 5:11 AM CDT

Prez Yanks Pick for Top CIA Lawyer

'Enhanced interrogation' support drives Rizzo out of the running

(Newser) - The White House has dropped its nomination of John Rizzo as the CIA's top counsel after Democrats and human rights groups slammed him for supporting "enhanced interrogation" techniques. The career CIA lawyer sent a letter to President Bush withdrawing his nomination yesterday, Reuters reports. Rizzo retreated because he had...

US Agencies Aided German Terror Probe

Sep 11, 2007 3:11 PM CDT

US Agencies Aided German Terror Probe

Capture of suspects in bomb plot a joint effort with the CIA

(Newser) - The CIA and NSA played a marquee role in last week’s capture of three men suspected of planning major terror attacks in Germany. For several months, Angela Merkel’s chief of staff held a weekly meeting about the plotters, Der Spiegel reports, and the cooperation was so significant that...

Tenet Just Didn't Get It

Aug 21, 2007 2:18 PM CDT

Tenet Just Didn't Get It

IG report says ex-director knew about Qaeda threat but didn't respond

(Newser) - George Tenet’s CIA failed to stifle the al-Qaeda threat in the months leading up to 9/11, an internal report found by the agency's Inspector General found. A summary released today found the former director’s attention to methodology eclipsed his focus on strategy, the Times reports, in a rebuke...

Shrinks Fault CIA Torture Tactics

Aug 15, 2007 9:50 AM CDT

Shrinks Fault CIA Torture Tactics

Professional group to condemn interrogation techniques

(Newser) - The American Psychological Association, long chummy with the CIA, is set to condemn tactics the spy agency has been using to interrogate terror detainees, writes Salon. Members have in the past worked with the CIA to design techniques: now the group wants to distance itself by formally opposing a long...

CIA, Wal-Mart, Fox News Purge Wiki Entries

Aug 14, 2007 1:33 PM CDT

CIA, Wal-Mart, Fox News Purge Wiki Entries

Hacker reveals vanity changes to online encyclopedia articles

(Newser) - A new data-mining tool has tracked the identities of the anonymous users who make edits to Wikipedia entries—and revealed that Wal-Mart, voting-machine magnate Diebold, and even Fox News have tried to bowdlerize or spin their appearances in the online encyclopedia. And they're not the only ones, Wired reports.

CIA Superspy Unmasks
After 3 Decades

Aug 8, 2007 5:09 PM CDT

CIA Superspy Unmasks After 3 Decades

Clandestine service head blows own cover before retirement

(Newser) - As he prepares for retirement, the CIA's chief spymaster has elected to reveal his true identity, the AP reports. Jose Rodriguez spent more than 30 years undercover, much of the time in Latin America; the Puerto Rico native has headed the agency's clandestine service since 2004. An agency spokesman says...

Judge Scissors Out Parts of Plame Memoir

Aug 3, 2007 3:13 PM CDT

Judge Scissors Out Parts of Plame Memoir

Court rules ex-agent can't reveal dates of CIA employment

(Newser) - Valerie Plame won't be allowed to disclose the dates she worked for the CIA in her upcoming memoir because it's classified information, a federal judge ruled today. The outed agent and publisher Simon & Schuster sued to keep the CIA from quashing info in her book, Fair Game: My Life ...

Bush OKs New Interrogation Guidelines

Jul 21, 2007 9:36 AM CDT

Bush OKs New Interrogation Guidelines

CIA program will continue with "enhanced" methods

(Newser) - President Bush set broad new limits for questioning of CIA terror detainees yesterday, the Washington Post reports. The new regulations for "enhanced" interrogations—used to press suspects by means not allowed in US military custody—are an attempt at partial compliance with the Geneva Conventions.

Bush Contorts Qaeda Threat, Critics Charge

Jul 13, 2007 10:23 AM CDT

Bush Contorts Qaeda Threat, Critics Charge

Iraqi insurgents' links to Bin Laden group said to be consistently misstated

(Newser) - With George Bush using the words "al Qaeda" more than 30 times in his speech on Iraq yesterday, critics charge that he's persistently distorting links between the global Al Qaeda organization and the Iraqi insurgency. The Al Qaeda faction fighting in Iraq is largely an independent Iraqi phenomenon, the...

Iraq in Free Fall, CIA Boss Warned

Jul 12, 2007 5:01 AM CDT

Iraq in Free Fall, CIA Boss Warned

'Irreversible' problems for government bared in secret meeting

(Newser) - The CIA director painted a grim picture of a deteriorating situation in Iraq sharply at odds with President Bush's sunny view in a closed-door session of the Iraq Study Group last November, Bob Woodward reports in the Washington Post. "The government is unable to govern," Michael Hayden flatly...

Why Bush Let Scooter Skate

Jul 3, 2007 5:58 AM CDT

Why Bush Let Scooter Skate

President, 'liberated' by his unpopularity, acted unilaterally

(Newser) - President Bush's dwindling popularity played a major role in his decision to commute the prison sentence for Scooter Libby, according to the Times. The ostracized president had little left to lose by saving Libby from prison and, in the words of one Republican observer, knew he was "going to...

CIA Dirty Deeds Detailed in Documents

Jun 27, 2007 5:13 AM CDT

CIA Dirty Deeds Detailed in Documents

Illicit 'family jewels' of Watergate era declassified

(Newser) - Assassination plots, illegal wiretapping and spying at political conventions were among the lowlights illuminated in hundreds of pages of CIA documents from the Watergate era declassified yesterday. Illicit acts known in the agency as the "family jewels" included a $150,000 CIA payment to a mobster to kill Fidel...

Extradite CIA Kidnappers, Germans Demand

Jun 26, 2007 5:39 AM CDT

Extradite CIA Kidnappers, Germans Demand

Crackdown strains US-German relations

(Newser) - Germany is demanding the extradition of 10 CIA agents for the kidnapping of suspected terrorist Khaled el-Masri in 2004, Der Spiegel reports. The German citizen was flown to Afghanistan in what is known as as "extraordinary rendition." The case is similar to one in Italy in which 26...

CIA Set to Let Skeletons
Out of Closet

Jun 22, 2007 2:08 PM CDT

CIA Set to Let Skeletons Out of Closet

Agency prepares to declassify docs showing decades of abuses

(Newser) - The CIA is about to release secret records of its illegal activities from the '50s to the '70s, reports the Washington Post. Known as the "family jewels," the long-sought documents detail assassination attempts, kidnappings, wiretaps, drug tests on civilians, monitoring of journalists (including muckraking columnist Jack Anderson), and...

CIA Helped Devise Torture Tactics

Jun 21, 2007 6:25 PM CDT

CIA Helped Devise Torture Tactics

Agency believed to have teamed up with Pentagon

(Newser) - The CIA apparently colluded with the US military to develop torture techniques for interrogating terrorist suspects, Salon reports. The program was based on methods originally designed to teach American special forces how to withstand abuse if captured. While the military's role in this "reverse engineering" had been previously exposed,...

CIA Uses Spies From Sudan to Infiltrate Iraq

Jun 11, 2007 12:32 PM CDT

CIA Uses Spies From Sudan to Infiltrate Iraq

Secret cooperation said to undercut Bush actions against genocide

(Newser) - The CIA is secretly working with the Sudanese government to send spies into Iraq, even as the US condemns the regime's role in the Darfur genocide, the LA Times reports. Sudan's position as a gateway for Islamic militants heading for Iraq and Pakistan makes it ideal for sending spies into...

Rights Groups Pressure US

Jun 8, 2007 9:36 AM CDT

Rights Groups Pressure US

Report urges release of info on "disappeared" terror suspects

(Newser) - Six prominent human rights groups want the US to disclose the whereabouts of 39 terrorism suspects, or "ghost prisoners," believed to have been in government custody. The organizations released a report today charging that children as young as 7 have been detained, invoking the loaded term "disappeared,...