MOSCOW — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday that an international ban on torture applies to U.S. personnel overseas, in a statement that was apparently meant to ease growing concerns but that sowed new confusion about controversial American policies on treatment of terrorism suspects.
Rice said that "as a matter of U.S. policy," American obligations under the U.N. Convention Against Torture, which also bans cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment, applies to U.S. personnel both in the United States and around the world.
Rice's remarks came amid complaints from Europeans about what they see as harsh and possibly illegal American treatment of terrorism suspects overseas. Rice's comments were interpreted by some U.S. lawmakers and human rights advocates as a sign that the Bush administration was giving ground in the face of international and congressional pressure, but it was unclear whether her statement heralded any change in policies or practices.
The confusion underscored how much suspicion and uncertainty surrounds the subject, even among lawmakers, analysts and advocates who follow the subject closely.
On a tour of Europe that began Monday, Rice has been engulfed by criticism over reports that CIA planes used airports on the continent as stopovers while transporting prisoners to secret interrogation sites. Rice has insisted that U.S. personnel don't use torture, and has argued that American counter-terrorism efforts on the continent help protect Europeans from extremist attacks.
Yet, questions about the behavior of U.S. personnel abroad have lingered, fed in part by the revelation of abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq; the denial of civilian court trials to detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; and the acknowledged American policy of "extraordinary renditions," in which terrorism suspects are seized in one country and flown to another nation for interrogation.
Rice's latest comments left much unclear. She did not try to define banned prisoner interrogation measures or specify what, in the American view, constitutes cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment. She also did not address restrictions imposed by the torture convention on U.S. security contractors.
Some saw her statement, at a news conference in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, as a shift from a legal opinion offered by U.S. Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales, who said in Senate testimony this year that U.S. personnel overseas were not legally bound by the U.N. convention's restrictions on cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment.
