On Friday, the government released more documents detailing the Bush administration’s torture program. The documents were handed over as a part of our ongoing litigation under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) for information related to the treatment of detainees in U.S. custody overseas.

The documents released include: a less-classified version of a report from the Justice Department’s (DOJ) Office of the Inspector General relating to the involvement of FBI agents in the interrogations in Guantánamo Bay, Afghanistan and Iraq; documents gathered by the DOJ’s Office of the Inspector General in preparing its report; and CIA documents relating to interrogations at black sites overseas. The newly released documents are among thousands of pages of government records detailing the interrogation of prisoners by the FBI, Department of Defense (DOD) and CIA that have been made public as a result of our lawsuits.

An Associated Press story about the documents reports on some of the gruesome details contained within the documents:

As the CIA began to use harsh interrogation techniques against captured terror suspects, the FBI became wary of the legality of the methods, which ranged from forced nudity to waterboarding, a form of simulated drowning. As a result, FBI agents were ordered not to participate in such harsh interrogations.

Yet sometime in late 2002, an FBI agent interviewed accused Sept. 11 plotter Ramzi Binalshibh at a CIA site. The agent later said he got valuable information out of Binalshibh before the CIA shut down the questioning.

According to one document, FBI officials told investigators when they arrived at the unidentified CIA site "the detainees were manacled to the ceiling and subjected to blaring music around the clock."

The FBI agents worked with the CIA in developing questions, but were denied direct access to Binalshibh for four or five days, according to a report on detainee interrogations by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine.

The report says eventually one agent was allowed to speak to Binalshibh for about 45 minutes.

"Binalshibh was naked and chained to the floor," the report said. The FBI agent later said "he obtained valuable actionable intelligence in a short time but that the CIA quickly shut down the interview."

The report said FBI officials later had serious misgivings about their participation in the Binalshibh interrogation.

The documents released last week add to our knowledge about the origins, scope and consequences of the Bush administration’s torture program. The documents are a reminder of the gross human rights abuses that have yet to be investigated seriously by Congress or the Justice Department

In a press release, Jameel Jaffer, Director of the ACLU’s National Security Project stated, “The last administration's decision to endorse torture undermined the United States' moral authority and compromised its security, but the failure of the country's current leadership to fully confront the abuses of the last administration is only compounding these harms.”

You can find the newly disclosed documents here, search through the over 130,000 pages we’ve unearthed through our lawsuit on our Accountability for Torture site, and read our ongoing account of the Bush administration’s torture program at The Torture Report. After you’ve seen the evidence for yourself, we hope you’ll join us in urging Attorney General Holder to launch a full and thorough torture investigation that follows the facts wherever they may lead.

Last week, a coalition of musicians filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to find out if their music had been used during the interrogation of detainees in U.S. custody. Last night, Rosanne Cash, one of the musicians who filed the request, appeared on The Colbert Report to go head-to-head with Stephen Colbert on the use of “torture music” at Guantánamo.

Cash held her ground with the wily Colbert, stating, “Using music, a creative art, for the exact opposite purpose, to use it as a weapon to hurt someone, it’s wrong. There is no gray area, it’s wrong.”  She even convinced Colbert to sign a letter agreeing with Gen. Colin Powell that Guantánamo “should be closed this afternoon.”

To join Rosanne Cash and Stephen Colbert and to learn more about the coalition of musicians who have joined the new National Campaign to Close Guantánamo, head on over to www.closegitmonow.org.

Today, the Los Angeles Times reports on the struggle of former Guantánamo detainee Mohammed Jawad to readjust to freedom after spending roughly a third of his life in detention. In August, as a result of the ACLU's habeas corpus petition on behalf of Jawad, he was finally released and sent home to Afghanistan after six-and-a-half-years in U.S. custody.

While in U.S. custody, Jawad, one of the youngest prisoners held at Guantánamo, was held in solitary confinement and subjected to the infamous "frequent flyer" sleep deprivation program. He attempted suicide in December 2003 by repeatedly slamming his head against his cell wall. Two judges — first his military commission judge, then a federal judge — ruled that evidence gleaned through Jawad's torture and coercion was inadmissible.

The LA Times story sheds light on the difficulties of adjusting to life after Guantánamo:

[Jawad]...suffers from frequent headaches, he says, and often rests during the day. Prison memories haunt him, something doctors warn may never end. He worries about those left behind, his de facto family. He's out and they're not, and that's a source of guilt. Though the Obama administration has said it will close Guantánamo, hundreds of detainees remain there and at Bagram.

He asks a reporter to tell President Obama, the United Nations, someone, to help them. "People there are sick," he says. "They should be treated. They should be freed."

As his anger rises, his uncle tells him not to think about the lost years.

But it spills out. He talks about having his hands bound behind his back and being forced to eat like a dog, being kicked, beaten and pepper-sprayed and subjected to excessive heat, loud noise, solitary confinement.

After a year, Guantánamo records show, Jawad tried to commit suicide by banging his head against his cell wall repeatedly.

"I was tortured and faced many problems," he says. "They also play with your mind."

In spite of this, Jawad has hope for the future. The article states that Jawad wants to be a doctor and "[h]e wants to resume his education, he says, even if it means sitting with 13-year-olds at tiny desks." Jawad goes on to state, "That's my dream... I don't know if it's possible. But that's my dream."

The story also quotes one of Jawad's military lawyers, Eric Montalvo, as saying, "We need to do more than just dump him on the corner with a bus ticket after seven years and say, 'Have a nice day.'"

Promptly and justly handling the cases of remaining prisoners is one part of the Guantánamo challenge. Honestly confronting the crimes committed in America's name at the notorious prison camp is another. Americans deserve to know who authorized, condoned and encouraged the abuse and torture of detainees like Jawad; let Attorney General Eric Holder know that you stand with the ACLU and support a thorough investigation of torture crimes.

Today, a federal court ruled that the government can continue suppressing transcripts in which former CIA prisoners now held at Guantánamo Bay describe abuse and torture suffered in CIA custody. The ruling came in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit we filed to obtain uncensored transcripts from Combatant Status Review Tribunals (CSRTs) used to determine if Guantánamo detainees qualify as "enemy combatants."

Back in June, the CIA released heavily-redacted versions of the documents, but it continues to suppress major portions of the documents, including detainees' allegations of torture. In August, the government filed a motion arguing that it should be able to continue suppressing the documents because releasing them would reveal "intelligence sources and methods" and might aid enemy "propaganda." In today's ruling, the judge declined to review "in camera" the documents the government is withholding in order to determine if they should remain classified.

Ben Wizner, staff attorney with the ACLU National Security Project, stated in a press release:

The court's ruling allows the government to continue suppressing these first-hand accounts of torture – not to protect any legitimate national security interest, but to protect current and former government officials from accountability. While much is known about the Bush administration's torture program, the CIA continues to censor the most important eyewitnesses – the torture victims themselves.

The public has a right to a comprehensive record of what took place in the CIA's secret prisons. The CSRT records will provide critical missing information about how the CIA's torture program was actually carried out and whether interrogators followed, or exceeded, Justice Department legal guidance that purported to authorize brutal interrogations.

The courts have the authority and the responsibility to ensure that the administration does not deprive the public of critical information for improper purposes. The ACLU will appeal today's decision.

To learn more about the ACLU's CSRT FOIA visit: www.aclu.org/safefree/torture/csrtfoia.html