The Guardian, GUANTANAMO BAY, CubaA CIA contract psychologist who helped draft the US program of “enhanced interrogation” of suspected terrorists has told a military tribunal that he was unable to stop cases of “abusive drift” by an unnamed senior agency official. Giving evidence at a military commission on Guantanamo Bay, James Mitchell gave a detailed account of the 2002 decision to interrogate suspected al-Qaeda leaders using waterboarding and other techniques, which the US later admitted constituted torture. “The CIA was never interested in prosecution,” he told the court. In court on Tuesday he described these excesses as “abusive drift.”“When people are left to make up coercive measures, it tends to escalate over time,” Mitchell said. They think they are justified in using a higher level of pressure.
