Ashcroft, Dems squabble over torture memos

The attorney general says Bush rejects torture.
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
WASHINGTON -- Attorney General John Ashcroft faced off Tuesday with Senate Democrats who demanded that he release memos in which Bush administration lawyers reportedly said that torture may be justified when used against captured Al-Qaida terrorists abroad.
Ashcroft repeatedly refused to disclose the leaked memos, including one from the Justice Department in 2002 detailed by the Washington Post. That memo suggested international laws against torture, including the Geneva Convention, may be unconstitutional restraints on the president in U.S. interrogations of terrorists.
Denies order
"First of all, this administration rejects torture," Ashcroft said. He later said that "the president has issued no such order" to immunize U.S. interrogators from prosecution for torture of imprisoned terrorists. He said he would not release the memos because President Bush had the right as chief executive to confidential legal advice from the Justice Department.
Critics noted that, in light of congressional investigations of the U.S. military abuse of prisoners in Iraq, the documents could well provide insight into whether the memos could have prompted a turning point in military treatment of prisoners.
Kennedy questions order
Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., asked whether Bush had followed the memos' advice with orders to authorize torture and held up a photograph that portrayed abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu-Ghraib prison.
"This is what directly results when you have that kind of memorandum out there," Kennedy told Ashcroft during his three-hour appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Ashcroft replied, "Let me completely reject the notion that anything that this president has done or the Justice Department has done has directly resulted in the kinds of atrocities which were cited." He said the government is prosecuting U.S. military officials who participated in the conduct at Abu-Ghraib. "That is false," he said of Kennedy's comment. "It is an inappropriate conclusion."