MOSCOW, December 10 (Sputnik) – The US Justice Department has refused to resume a torture inquiry and bring any criminal charges against CIA officers, responsible for tortures and brutal interrogations of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, according to CBS News.
The Justice Department rejected the prosecution of CIA officers on the ground that "the admissible evidence would not be sufficient to obtain and sustain convictions beyond a reasonable doubt." The decision, passed on Tuesday, led to renewed discussions about possible penal measures for those responsible for the use of inhumane practices against detainees of the notorious US prison.
"The true test of our nation's character comes now,'' said Elizabeth Goitein, co-director of the Brennan Center for Justice's Liberty and National Security Program, cited by USA Today. "Will we make excuses and try to defend the indefensible? Or will we finally acknowledge that our nation crossed a terrible line, and start talking about accountability?''
Some legal experts and rights organizations claim that information given in the Senate Intelligence Committee's report can serve as evidence of committed crimes, which require hard punishment. Others suggest that only the adoption of new legal provisions and a respective transformation of the national legal system, as well as the abolition of certain governmental structures that allowed such a brutal interrogation program to emerge, could have any positive achievements in terms of accountability, according to USA Today.
"At every level, we need to hold the system accountable,'' Goitein said. "This wasn't just the work of rogue officials,'' she added.
According to the US Senate Report, Guantanamo detainees were subjects to cruel tortures such as waterboarding, sleep deprivation and death threats, which led to serious psychological problems such as “hallucinations, paranoia, insomnia, and attempts at self-harm and self-mutilation.”
