CIA Officials Campaign Against US Senate Torture Report

MOSCOW, December 11 (Sputnik) — High-ranking CIA officials have launched a campaign, criticizing the US Senate’s inquiry into the CIA’s brutal torture methods, claiming the document was based on adjusted evidence, Wall Street Journal reported.

Former CIA directors have called the report a “one-sided study marred by errors of fact and interpretation — essentially a poorly done and partisan attack on the agency that has done the most to protect America,” according to the newspaper.

As reported by AP, CIA officials are trying to present the US Senate report as a political trick, used by Senate Democrats to discredit the program, which allegedly protected American citizens and saved their lives. Intelligence workers insist that the enhanced interrogation techniques contributed to the prevention of high-scale terrorist attacks and helped to capture leaders of terrorist groups.

The Senate Intelligence Committee's report has provided evidence of brutal treatment and torture, committed by CIA officers against detainees at Guantanamo Bay. The list of cruel interrogation techniques included dietary manipulation, sleep deprivation, waterboarding and other torture practices which led to severe psychological problems by prisoners.

The report has caused international uproar, forcing the CIA to defend itself in public – a task, which the Agency, designed “to protect the country secretly”, has not got used to, AP reported.

Though the US Justice Department has refused to bring charges against those responsible for using inhuman torture methods, a UN special investigator announced that perpetrators should be held accountable for what they did. Human rights organizations also have called on US authorities to arrest top CIA officials if they travel abroad, emphasizing the threat of punishment for ex-interrogators, according to the news agency.