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Gina Haspel's CIA nomination demands the United States account for its history of torture
Dorfman, Ariel
http://www.counterpunch.org/2018/03/28/its-time-the-united-states-accounts-for-its-history-of-torture/http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-dorfman-gina-haspel-nomination-20180325-story.html Date Written: 2018-03-25 Publisher: Los Angeles Times Year Published: 2018 Resource Type: Article Cx Number: CX22195 President Trump's nomination of Gina Haspel to head the CIA has stirred objections from many quarters. Dorfman recounts the impact of state sanctioned torture in Chile. Abstract: - Excerpt: President Trump's nomination of Gina Haspel to head the CIA has stirred objections from many quarters. After 9/11, Haspel ran an illegal black site in Thailand where a man was tortured, and she later wrote a memo calling for the destruction of proof of such "enhanced interrogations." She has paid no price for these actions, nor has she been called to account for them. As a native of Chile, I can attest to how difficult it is for a people to confront horrors committed in their name, how disturbing to acknowledge a monstrous past. But that hard work of reckoning is crucial. In 1973, Salvador Allende, the democratically elected president of Chile, was overthrown by the military. During the 17-year dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet that followed, legions of Allende's followers, accused of being terrorists and enemies of the state, were unspeakably brutalized in secret detention centers run by agents of Chile's intelligence services. More than 3,000 prisoners were executed, and close to 40,000 were traumatized and scarred for life. Subject Headings |