After September 11, 2001, U.S. officials authorized the cruel treatment and torture of prisoners held in Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo, and the CIA's secret prisons overseas.

This database documents the U.S. government's official experiment with torture. At present, the database contains well over 100,000 pages of government documents obtained primarily through Freedom of Information Act litigation and requests filed by the ACLU, and through litigation of Salim v. Mitchell, a lawsuit brought by the ACLU on behalf of the survivors and the family of a dead victim of the CIA torture program. To learn more about the database, please read the About and Search Help pages. If you're a developer, you can also access this data through our API.

Search Result (267)

RelevanceDateRelease Date
State Department cable stating that the U.S. has come to an agreement to return five (5) Guantanamo detainees back to their home country. The agreement includes assurances from the receiving country that the detainees will receive humane ...
June 08, 2005
Cable
Colin L. Powell
Colin L. Powell, Ronald W. Miller, Pierre-Richard Prosper
This memo is to address questions and concerns over the status and treatment of Guantanamo detainees. The memo states that: 1) the U.S. does not permit, tolerate or condone torture; 2) Detainees get excellent medical care; 3) the Al-Qaeda ...
June 08, 2005
Cable
Colin L. Powell
Colin L. Powell, George W. Bush
This White House memo discusses the treatment of detainees taken in the War on Terror and how they are to be classified and the determination of their legal status.
Hand written note from Colin Powell to Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz concerning a note from UK Foreign Minister Jack Straw.
Letter from Tausif Paracha, U.S. citizen, to Colin L. Powell regarding the detainment of his/her uncle, Saifullah Paracha. Mr. Paracha was taken into custody on July 5th by U.S. soldiers and according to a letter sent by the International ...
Nov. 23, 2004
Letter
Colin L. Powell
Saifullah Paracha
Email discusses the detention of Jordanian's in Iraq. It mentions that the Jordanian Parliament alleged that more than 1000 Jordanians were in Coalition custody in Iraq, whereas the Jordan Ministry of Foreign Affairs believed 19 Jordanians were ...
This is a State Department talking points memo on how to address the issues of detainees and detainee abuse. It references speeches and interviews that President Bush and other administration officials have given to describe and give context as ...
This State Department cable is a synopsis of a meeting held at Sec. of State Powell's offices on January 15, 2004. The meeting was attended by: Sec. of State Powell; A/S Arthur E. Dewey; Craig Kelly; JoAnn Dolan and Carrie Santos on the U.S. ...
Nov. 23, 2004
Cable
Colin L. Powell, Christophe Girod, Arthur E. Dewey , Craig A. Kelly
This cable address questions and concerns over the visiting, the status and treatment of Guantanamo detainees. The memo states that the detainees are illegal combatants, and not Prisoners of War (POWs). It states Al Qaeda is a foreign terrorist ...
Aug. 09, 2005
Cable
Colin L. Powell
Colin L. Powell