Italy’s High Court has upheld the sentences of 23 CIA
operatives convicted of kidnapping a Muslim cleric under the U.S.
program of "extraordinary rendition." The cleric, Abu Omar, was seized
from the streets of Milan in 2003 and taken to U.S. bases in Italy and
Germany before being sent to Egypt, where he was tortured during a
four-year imprisonment. The Americans were all convicted in absentia
after the United States refused to hand them over. The ruling marks the
final appeal in the first trial anywhere in the world involving the
CIA’s practice of rendering terror suspects to countries that allow
torture. But back in 2008, then presidential candidate Barack Obama
unequivocally denounced torture and extraordinary rendition. Well,
according to our guest, four years after Obama made those comments
impunity for torture has now become a bipartisan policy of the U.S.
government. For more, we speak with Alfred McCoy, a professor of history
at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is the author of the new
book, "Torture and Impunity: The U.S. Doctrine of Coercive
Interrogation.”Video
Source: Democracy Now!
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