Americans' torture support disturbing

The US Senate report on the CIA's torture methods that was made public last week has raised some serious questions: Is the United States still practicing or will continue practicing water-boarding, sleep depriving and other appalling torture techniques? Will it use them citing imminent threat to national security?

Such concern is justified despite the torture report talking mostly about the practice under the administration of former US president George W. Bush.

It is true that President Barack Obama was the one who prohibited the use of such torture methods because, as he said in April 2009, "they undermine our moral authority and do not make us safer". Obama has supported the declassification of the documents and said that, if CIA agents are still using such torture techniques, "they would be directly violating the orders that I've issued as president and commander in chief."

That incidentally also suggests Obama is not absolutely sure if the so-called enhanced interrogation techniques, or EITs, have really been abandoned by the CIA. While the efforts of Obama and Senator Dianne Feinstein, who released the report on the CIA last week, are aimed at regaining the moral high ground for the US, they are far from enough to ensure that such crimes are not repeated in the US.

First, neither Obama nor Feinstein has talked about bringing people responsible for using EITs to justice despite the fact that they violated US laws. This is in sharp contrast to what the US has done on the international stage in the past: pushing for the trial of people responsible for using inhuman torture methods in other countries. Ironically, the US is still not a participant in the International Criminal Court based in The Hague.

So, while applauding Obama and Feinstein for the release of the report, many people have expressed disappointment with the US president for not pushing for charges against the human rights violators.

Second, the prosecution of those responsible for using EITs will not only show that the US is more determined than ever to reject such inhuman torture methods, but it will also help the US regain the moral high ground and deter the CIA from indulging in such practices again.