PREVENTION AND CONFLICT

On the Record: US Disclosures on Rendition, Secret Detention, and Coercive Interrogation

This report is a joint effort between the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice and Amnesty International, Cageprisoners, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Human Rights Watch, and Reprieve.

This report aims to shed light both on what has been revealed and what has been obscured by the U.S. government. It also seeks to demonstrate the enormous range of information that is in the public sphere about the nature and scope of the U.S. rendition, secret detention, and coercive interrogation activities. This exercise makes it increasingly evident that the threats of disclosure of “state secrets” and harm to national security are ill-founded, and that the real concern lies in the very fact that a program of this nature exists and continues to operate.

According to the United States (U.S.) government, shortly after September 11, 2001, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was tasked with planning a “separate” program to begin secretly detaining and interrogating individuals outside of the United States. At that time, the CIA was also reportedly authorized to forcibly transfer individuals to foreign countries for interrogation in a practice commonly known as “rendition” or “extraordinary rendition.” Starting with the rendition of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi to Egypt in January 2002, and the detention and interrogation of Abu Zubaydah in March 2002,4 the U.S. post-9/11 rendition, secret detention, and coercive interrogation program has since swept up many individuals, the vast majority of whom are still unaccounted for by the United States. 

Between 2001 and September 2006, information about CIA rendition, secret detention, and coercive interrogation operations emerged piecemeal. The U.S. government was the source of some of this information: officials discussed rendition in the media and on Capitol Hill, but gave only partial accounts; they announced the capture of individuals, but refused to disclose their whereabouts; and they informed the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the U.S. (the 9/11 Commission) that certain individuals were “currently in U.S. custody,” but refused to give the Commission the access it sought to the detainees themselves. The U.S. government also provided “statements” culled from interrogations on behalf of certain secret CIA detainees in the cases of United States v. Paracha and United States v. Moussaoui. Media, inter-governmental bodies (such as the Council of Europe and the United Nations (UN)), human rights organizations, and former detainees also provided comprehensive insights into the CIA’s activities. 

In an effort to obtain further information from the U.S. government about its rendition, secret detention, and coercive interrogation activities, in 2004, 2006, and 2007, Amnesty International USA (AIUSA), the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), and the International Human Rights Clinic at NYU School of Law Center for Human Rights and Global Justice submitted Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to several U.S. agencies, including the CIA. Following a refusal to disclose the majority of the information sought, AIUSA, CCR, and NYU IHRC filed suit in June 2007 in federal court in the Southern District of New York. In spring 2008, the CIA admitted that it had more than 7,000 relevant documents, but sought a ruling that it did not need to disclose the vast majority of those documents, arguing, inter alia, that it cannot be compelled to disclose information it argues is properly classified. In response, on June 26, 2008, AIUSA, CCR, and NYU IHRC filed an opposition to the CIA’s motion for summary judgment and a memorandum of law in support of a cross-motion for partial summary judgment.