Doesn't surprise me, what surprises me is that the government doesn't automatically convert video to digital video, and store it somewhere underneath Utah or similar. The technology exists, and is pretty fool-proof. As far as destroying evidence of crimes (against humanity, even if tacitly encouraged by the thugs currently running our country in the ditch), the CIA are not stupid fools: torture video porn is very, very popular grist for the corporate media mill, worldwide.
The CIA says it destroyed tapes on the interrogation of al-Qaeda suspects, raising fears over the use of torture.
[snip]
The American Civil Liberties Union has accused the agency of showing an utter disregard for the law.
"The destruction of these tapes appears to be a part of an extensive, long-term pattern of misusing executive authority to insulate individuals from criminal prosecution for torture and abuse," an ACLU statement said.
[snip]
There are also questions over whether CIA agents withheld information from the courts and a presidential commission.
The CIA's failure to make the tapes available to a federal court hearing the case of the terror suspect Zacarias Moussaoui or to the 9/11 Commission could amount to obstruction of justice, according to the New York Times.
Lawyers in the Moussaoui trial and officials from the 9/11 Commission had both requested from the CIA details of any relevant interrogations of al-Qaeda suspects.
Michael Hayden wrote to all CIA employees about the tapes After the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the US, President George W Bush authorised the use of "harsh techniques" in the interrogation of suspected terrorists.
According to our correspondent, those techniques are alleged to have included water-boarding, a method in which a suspect is held down and gagged while water is poured into his mouth in order to simulate drowning.
Human rights groups say that water-boarding - and other techniques allegedly used by the CIA - can be defined as torture under various international treaties to which the US is a signatory.
[From CIA destroyed interrogation tapes]
