http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,2001350021-2001364909,00.html
FBI considers
torture as suspects stay silent
FROM DAMIAN WHITWORTH IN WASHINGTON
AMERICAN
investigators are considering resorting to harsher
interrogation techniques, including
torture, after facing a wall of
silence from jailed suspected members of Osama bin
Ladens al-Qaeda
network, according to a report yesterday.
More than 150 people who
were picked up after September 11 remain in
custody, with four men the focus of
particularly intense scrutiny. But
investigators have found the usual methods have
failed to persuade any
of them to talk.
Options being weighed include truth drugs,
pressure tactics and
extraditing the suspects to countries whose security services are
more
used to employing a heavy-handed approach during interrogations.
Were into
this thing for 35 days and nobody is talking. Frustration
has begun to appear, a
senior FBI official told The Washington Post.
Under US law, evidence !
extracted using physical pressure or torture is
inadmissible in court and
interrogators could also face criminal
charges for employing such methods. However,
investigators suggested
that the time might soon come when a truth serum, such as
sodium
pentothal, would be deemed an acceptable tool for interrogators.
The public
pressure for results in the war on terrorism might also
persuade the FBI to encourage
the countries of suspects to seek their
extradition, in the knowledge that they could
be given a much rougher
reception in jails back home.
One of the four key suspects is
Zacarias Moussaoui, a French Moroccan,
suspected of being a twentieth hijacker who
failed to make it on board
the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. Moussaoui was
detained after
he acted suspiciously at a Minnesota flying school, requesting lessons
in how to steer a plane but not how to take off or land. Both Morocco
and France are
regarded as having harsher interrogation methods than
the United States!
.
The investigators have been disappointed that the usual incentives to
break
suspects, such as promises of shorter sentences, money, jobs and
new lives in the
witness protection programme, have failed to break
the silence.
We are known for
humanitarian treatment, so basically we are stuck.
Usually there is some incentive,
some angle to play, what you can do
for them. But it could get to that spot where we
could go to pressure
. . . where we dont have a choice, and we are probably getting
there, an FBI agent involved in the investigation told the paper.
The other key
suspects being held in New York are Mohammed Jaweed
Azmath and Ayub Ali Khan, Indians
who were caught the day after the
attacks travelling with false passports, craft
knives such as those
used in the hijackings and hair dye. Nabil Almarabh, a Boston
taxi
driver alleged to have links to al-Qaeda, is also being held. Some
legal experts
believe that the US Supreme Court, which has a
conservative tilt, might !
be prepared to support curtailing the civil
liberties of prisoners in terrorism cases.
However, a warning that torture should be avoided came from Robert
Blitzer, a former
head of the FBIs counter-terrorism section. He said
that the practice goes against
every grain in my body. Chances are
you are going to get the wrong person and risk
damage or killing
them.
In all, about 800 people have been rounded up since the
attacks, most
of whom are expected to be found to be innocent. Investigators believe
there could be hundreds of people linked to al-Qaeda living in the US,
and the Bush
Administration has issued a warning that more attacks are
probably being planned.
Newsweek magazine reports today that Mohammed Atta, the suspected
ringleader who died
in the first plane to hit the World Trade Centre,
had been looking into hitting an
aircraft carrier. Investigators
retracing his movements found that he visited the huge
US Navy base at
Norfolk, Virginia, in February and April t!
his year.
