| Page 2 of 2 < |
AP Poll: Most Say Torture OK in Rare Cases
The Bush administration has taken the position that some terrorism suspects are "enemy combatants" not protected by the Geneva Conventions, international treaties on the rights of prisoners of war.
"The Bush administration policy is against torture of any kind; it's prohibited by federal criminal law," said John Yoo, a University of California-Berkeley, law professor. As a Justice Department lawyer, he helped write internal memos in 2002 designed to give the government more leeway in aggressive questioning of terror suspects.
"The debate is whether you can use interrogation methods that are short of torture," he said. "Some who have been critical of the Bush administration have confused torture with cruel, inhumane treatment."
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., is among those pushing to ban the use of torture as well as "cruel and inhumane treatment." His legislation was approved in the Senate by a wide margin and will be considered in House and Senate conference committees as an amendment on two defense bills.
The polls of about 1,000 adults in each of the nine countries were conducted between Nov. 15 and Nov. 28. Each poll had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
___
On the Net: