US Senator John McCain has slammed contenders for next year’s presidential election for pledging to reinstate the waterboarding of terrorism suspects if they win the White House.
McCain, a former prisoner of war in Vietnam, has consistently described waterboarding as torture.
He said in a tweet on Monday that he was “very disappointed” by support for the technique from Herman Cain, former Texas governor Rick Perry and US Representative Michele Bachmann at Saturday’s Republican foreign policy debate in South Carolina.
The candidates criticized US President Barack Obama for banning the use of waterboarding and said they would reinstate its use if elected.
“Very disappointed by statements at SC GOP debate supporting waterboarding. Waterboarding is torture,” McCain said in his tweet.
Obama also criticized the Republican candidates.
“They’re wrong. Waterboarding is torture. It’s contrary to America’s traditions. It’s contrary to our ideals,” Obama said. “If we want to lead around the world, part of our leadership is setting a good example.”
Some Republican candidates said the use of the interrogation method, which simulates drowning, had produced valuable intelligence.
At the debate, Perry said: “I don’t see it as torture. I see it as an enhanced interrogation technique.”
Bachmann took a similar position.
“If I was president I would be willing to use waterboarding,” she said. “I want to save American lives ... I want the CIA to have every interrogation tool available.”
Yesterday she repeated her position on Fox News.
“No one died from the use of waterboarding. Is it uncomfortable? Yes, it’s uncomfortable, but our worry should not be the comfort level of terrorists,” she said.
Other Republican candidates, US Representative Ron Paul and former US ambassador John Huntsman, described waterboarding as unacceptable.
“It’s illegal,” Paul said.
The debate also produced a backlash against pledges to slash US aid to foreign countries — particularly when Perry said he would reassess the US$3 billion a year in mostly military assistance given to Israel.
“The foreign aid budget in my administration for every country is going to start at zero dollars,” Perry said during the debate.
He said there should then be a national debate on “whether or not a penny of our taxpayer dollars needs to go into those countries.”
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of