Obama lifts veil on Bush-era terror methods

US: President Barack Obama's administration lifted the veil further Monday on past "war on terror" tactics, releasing Bush-era legal memos and revealing the CIA destroyed 92 controversial interrogation videos.

Hours after Attorney General Eric Holder ruled out the use of waterboarding as an interrogation technique because it amounted to torture his Justice Department released nine internal documents from the previous administration, which had given legal grounding to the controversial policies. In further repudiation of president George W. Bush's anti-terror methods acting US Attorney Lev Dassin formally identified the number of tapes destroyed a far greater number than the CIA has admitted to.

In correspondence with a New York judge, who is hearing a case against the intelligence agency by a human rights group, Dassin asked the court to give the CIA until Friday to prepare any records on the tapes that were destroyed, as well as a list of possible witnesses.

Washington, Tuesday, AFP