compared with the secret prison in Iraq.

The Cheney torture program lives on.

So says Sheik al-Yawar, a Sunni Arab tribal leader in northern Iraq.  As reported in the New York Times yesterday, Human Rights Watch has provided details of a secret prison - al Muthanna - run by the Iraq Ministry of Defense. 

Muthanna prisoners interviewed by Human Rights Watch, “displayed fresh scars and wounds. Many said they were raped, sodomized with broomsticks and pistol barrels, or forced to engage in sexual acts with one another and their jailers.  

All said they were tortured by being hung upside down and then whipped and kicked before being suffocated with a plastic bag. Those who passed out were revived, they said, with electric shocks to their genitals and other parts of their bodies.” 

Iraq Prime Minister Maliki defended the torture program by saying: 

“America is the symbol of democracy, but then you have the abuses at Abu Ghraib…..The American government took tough measures, and we are doing the same, so where is the problem and why this raucousness?” 

How long will it take before the Obama administration realizes that it has an obligation to the citizens of this nation - indeed to the citizens of the world - to investigate and prosecute (if deemed necessary) the American leaders who authorized torture in the name of this country? 

Prime Minister Maliki’s statement symbolizes the current feeling of other national leaders regarding America’s inability to come to terms with its illegal torture program.  They are basically saying:

“You did it.  Why can’t we?”  

Until Dick Cheney, David Addington, John Yoo and the other leaders who authorized torture come to trial, America’s Torture Doctrine will remain as a dark cloud hanging over every aspect of our foreign relations. 

President Obama may feel that the actions of Cheney, et al, were pardonable offenses, and that is a legitimate presidential point of view.  But he cannot pardon these people unless they are first brought to trial.  The U.S. Constitution requires that the Department of Justice take this action. 

The Muthanna-type torture prisons have become “the way of the future”, and some of these torture prisons will eventually hold American captives.  Moreover, the future torturers will feel justified in their actions as long as our own alleged torture criminals remain above the law. 

The world is waiting for the Cheney Torture Team to be brought to trial.