Only eleven days before the start of Torture Awareness Month, the United States Senate has passed an amendment to a military supplemental appropriations bill that would give the Pentagon the power to conceal photographs of the torture of people held prisoner by the United States military.
The legislation, S. AMDT. 1157 to H.R. 2346, creates a special exception to the Freedom of Information Act, undermining that landmark open government legislation. The loophole allows the United States Secretary of Defense to keep photographs documenting the practice of torture by the U.S. military – even when petitions are properly filed through the Freedom of Information Act.
Most alarming, the legislation, crafted by United States Senator Joseph Lieberman, grants the power to conceal photographs of US military torture to be taken in the future, not just in the past.
This legislation thus creates the appearance that the United States Senate expects, and is planning for, the US military to torture additional prisoners in the future, and to take photographs documenting that torture. The Senate, rather than confronting this torture, is helping to make the torture easier to take place, and to keep out of the public eye.
Worst of all, the Senate passed amendment 1157, already being referred to as the Censorship of Photographs of Future Torture Amendment, was passed unanimously. Not a single member of the United States Senate, Republican or Democrat, opposed the pro-torture legislation.
2009 began as a year of hope for opponents of torture. Now, on the eve of Torture Awareness Month, hope has turned into bitter disappointment.
