CIA told interrogations were legal

The US justice department told the CIA in 2002 that its agents would not be prosecuted for carrying out harsh interrogations if they believed they would not cause "prolonged mental harm", according to a memo written by a senior official.

The memo, released on Thursday by a civil rights group, approved the CIA's harsh interrogation techniques method by method.

The August 1, 2002 legal opinion, signed by Jay Bybee, the then assistant attorney-general, was obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union along with other documents.

The heavily censored document specifically approved proposed interrogation techniques that were devised for use against al-Qaeda suspects who were resistant to other questioning methods.

However, it also warned that if circumstances changed, interrogators could be prosecuted under anti-torture laws.

The standards used to judge how physically rough an interrogation was were censored.

"The healthier the individual, the less likely that the use of any one procedure or set of procedures will result in prolonged mental harm."

Jay Bybee,
assistant attorney-general who wrote memo But interrogations that stressed a detainee psychologically or emotionally were not allowed to cause "prolonged mental harm".