WASHINGTON — Leon Panetta, the nominee for CIA director, assured senators Thursday that the Obama administration will not send prisoners to countries for torture or other treatment that violates U.S. values as he contended had occurred during the Bush presidency.
Panetta, testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee, later acknowledged that he does not know specifically what happened in the secret program allowing “extraordinary rendition.”
CIA Director Michael Hayden has said that the Bush administration moved secret prisoners between countries for interrogation and incarceration, separate from the judicial system, fewer than 100 times.
Panetta said that President Barack Obama forbids what Panetta called “that kind of extraordinary rendition — when we send someone for the purpose of torture or actions by another country that violate our human values.”
“What happened I can’t tell you specifically,” he said later, “but clearly steps were taken that prompted this president to say those things ought not to happen again.”
Rendition has been used by U.S. presidents for several decades; Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., said the Clinton administration used it 80 times. However, Panetta said the difference is whether the prisoner is transferred to another government for prosecution in its judicial system or for secret interrogations that may lead to torture.
Bush administration officials have said no prisoners were transferred without credible assurances from the host governments that the prisoners would not be tortured or treated in a way that violates international law.
Panetta said he considers appropriate those renditions that send individuals to other countries to face prosecution.
Panetta said there is no intention to hold CIA officers responsible for the policies they were told to carry out. CIA interrogators who used waterboarding or other harsh techniques against prisoners with the permission of the White House should not be prosecuted, he said.
But Panetta said that if interrogators went beyond the methods they were told were legal, they should be investigated.
“We can protect this country, we can get the information we need, we can provide for the security of the American people, and we can abide by the law,” he said. “I’m absolutely convinced that we can do that.”
Panetta said he would come to the job with a list of questions he wants the CIA to be able to answer, including the location of Osama bin Laden and when and where al-Qaeda will next try to attack the U.S. He also said he wants to increase intelligence gathering and analyses on potential problems with Russia, China, Africa and Latin America as well as the effects of the unfolding economic crisis.
“Our first responsibility,” he said, “is to prevent surprise.”
