Apr 23, 2009 6:42 pm US/Pacific
Pelosi Denies Knowlege Of Harsh CIA Interrogations
WASHINGTON (CBS 5 / AP) ―
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U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco.
CBS
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday denied knowing that CIA officials used waterboarding — despite GOP operatives claims that she was told about enhanced interrogation techniques in graphic detail in a 2002 briefing.
A timeline released by the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday said the CIA had told key members of Congressional intelligence panels in the fall of 2002 that waterboarding had been used on three detainees, Abu Zubaydah, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashir, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
But Pelosi, a San Francisco Democrat, on Thursday maintained she had not been briefed at the time.
"We were not - I repeat - were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used," Pelosi said.
She added that she had been told there was a legal memo that said they could be used, but not that they had.
Pelosi was replaced as senior Democrat on the Intelligence Committee in the fall of 2002 by Rep. Jane Harman, another California Democrat.
Pelosi's office referred reporters to a statement she had issued in 2007 saying that Harman "was briefed more extensively and advised the techniques had in fact been employed."
At the time, Harman wrote a letter - now public - to the CIA saying that the techniques described raised "profound policy questions."
Meantime, Pelosi reaffirmed her support for a truth commission to examine harsh Bush administration detainee interrogations "because I think this is very important." The question, she said Thursday, is whether there should be immunity from prosecution for testimony before such a commission.
The Obama administration has struggled to quell persistent Democratic demands for a potentially explosive probe of the issue, abruptly declaring opposition to an independent commission on Thursday.
(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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