Massive and systematic violations of human rights

Done by us to others in the name of liberty, freedom, and the spreading of democracy. The Bush administration has ruined the name of all that is good in the United States.

The special investigator concentrates essentially on two black sites in Poland and Romania. Discussing the Polish secret prison Stare Kiejkutz, Marty told the British TV station Channel Four: "The Polish setup was devoted to those people considered to be the most important terrorists, the ring leaders of the movement, who had the most responsibility. They were the most wanted men."

These so-called "high value detainees" (HVD) included the main strategist of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, high-ranking al-Qaida member Abu Zubaydah, and alleged 9/11 co-conspirator Ramzi Binalshibh.

Marty lists eight flights during the period between 2003 and 2005 alone that he and his assistants attribute to the CIA'S HVD program. Most of the planes came from Kabul. The black site at Mihail Kogalniceanu in Romania was in use between 2003 and 2005 and used for lower-ranking HVDs, according to the report.

[snip]

Marty's final report says records show that there were 1,245 proven CIA flights between 2002 and 2005, although it seems that only some of them were prisoner transfers.

The "series of illegal acts" carried out by the CIA was either tolerated or supported by the member countries of the Council of Europe, according to Marty. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) provided the necessary international backing through resolutions passed on Oct. 4, 2001 -- which allowed what Marty describes as "blank check" overflight permits, for example. Marty suggests that secret protocols, to which he does not have access, record additional concessions the Europeans made to the United States. During the negotiations over the secret prison in Romania, for example, the US promised Bucharest its support for the Eastern European's country application for full NATO membership, the report alleges.

US President George W. Bush officially acknowledged the existence of a classified CIA program for the seizure, arrest and interrogation of terror suspects on non-US territory only last September, announcing at the same time that the measure would be discontinued following the transfer of 14 suspects to Guantánamo.

Spencer Ackerman of TPM Muckraker quotes the report:

Clothes were cut up and torn off; many detainees were then kept naked for several weeks. ...

At one point in 2004, eight persons were being kept together at one CIA facility in Europe, but were administered according to a strict regime of isolation. Contact between them through sight or sound was forbidden... and prevented unless it was expressly decided to create limited conditions where they could see or come into contact with one another because it would serve (the CIA's) intelligence-gathering objectives to allow it. ...

The air in many cells emanated from a ventilation hole in the ceiling, which was often controlled to produce extremes of temperature: sometimes so hot that one would gasp for breath, sometimes freezing cold.

Many detainees described air conditioning for deliberate discomfort.

Detainees were exposed at times to over-heating in the cell; at other times drafts of freezing breeze.

Detainees never experienced natural light or natural darkness, although most were blindfolded many times so they could see nothing....

There was a shackling ring in the wall of the cell, about half a metre up off the floor. Detainees' hands and feet were clamped in handcuffs and leg irons. Bodies were regularly forced into contorted shapes and chained to this ring for long, painful periods.

And we're fighting to spread these freedoms to countries around the world even if they don't want them. Makes you feel proud all over, don't it?