JURIST - Paper Chase: Intelligence bill may restrict CIA interrogation tactics

[JURIST] CIA interrogators may be restricted to using only those interrogation techniques explicitly authorized by the 2006 Army Field Manual if US House and Senate lawmakers succeed in adding the restriction to an upcoming intelligence funding bill, aides working on the bill told AP under condition of anonymity on Wednesday. Army interrogation guide Field Manual 2-22.3 [PDF text; press release] explicitly prohibits the use of waterboarding, electrocution, sensory deprivation, inducing hypothermia, or depriving the subject of food, water, or medical care. The 2006 manual also specifies that the Geneva Conventions [ICRC materials] apply to all detainees [JURIST report] and eliminates separate standards for the questioning of prisoners of war and enemy combatants [JURIST news archive].

The proposed restriction on CIA interrogations may meet a veto challenge from President George W. Bush, who in July 2007 signed [JURIST report] a controversial executive order [text] that prohibits cruel and inhuman treatment during the interrogation of terror suspects detained by the CIA, but allows "enhanced interrogation techniques" and may exempt the CIA from Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. The order does not specify what specific interrogation techniques are now disallowed, but the order prohibits "acts intended to denigrate the religion, religious practices, or religious objects of the individual", and "torture" as defined in 18 USC 2340 [text]. AP has more.

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