Ex-FBI Official: 'We Left Our Most Important Prisoners To Amateurs'

[Surya Gayatri]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/former-fbi-official-ali-soufan-condemns-guantanamo-torture-a-1014475.html


The notorious "Camp X-Ray" has been abandoned, but the US prison facility at Guantanamo for suspected terrorists is still in operation.

Former FBI agent Ali Soufan was one of the first to interrogate terror suspects at Guantanamo. He later left the prison and criticized torture methods used by the CIA. He accuses the government of turning interrogations of inmates over to outsourced amateurs.

Ali Soufan, a 43-year-old US citizen, worked as a special agent for the FBI until 2005 as part of its efforts to combat terrorism. In March 2002, he and a colleague were the first to interrogate Abu Zubaydah, who at that point was considered the most important al-Qaida prisoner held by the Americans. Because Soufan was born in Lebanon and speaks Arabic, and because he could quote the Koran during questioning, he was able to build up trust with the prisoner.

He was able to glean extensive information from Zubaydah. Nevertheless, the CIA still chose Zubayadah as the first prisoner on whom to test its "enhanced interrogation techniques". He was forced to undergo waterboarding and other cruel measures at least 83 times. In the prison where Zubaydah was interrogated, Soufan met James Mitchell, one of the two highly controversial men behind the CIA interrogation programs. In protest over the torture methods, Soufan left Guantanamo in the summer of 2002.
...
SPIEGEL: Were details of the report still shocking to you, even though you had known about the allegations for years?

Soufan: At some point it was difficult for me to read on, especially the passages about the torture of the first important prisoner we interrogated, the terror facilitator Zubaydah. The level of unprofessionalism that the report reveals is incredible. It is really shocking. But I should not be surprised, given that 80 percent of this harsh interrogation program was outsourced to outside contractors who had no clue about interrogations. We left our most important prisoners to amateurs.
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SPIEGEL published this interview with Soufan in its Dec. 15, 2014 German-speaking issue. Excellent in-depth exposé of a first-hand personal experience now available in English.

[Baitball Blogger]

1. Outsourcing terrorism.

I wonder if this was an attempt to create plausible deniability?

[Mnemosyne]

2. K&R for more visibility. nt