American Civil Liberties Union

The ACLU filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request seeking information about "diplomatic assurances" for individuals transferred by the United States to countries known to employ torture.  “Diplomatic assurances” are assurances from countries with a known record of torture or ill-treatment that they will treat prisoners humanely. International law dictates that countries must not expel, return, or extradite any person to a country where they risk torture. “Diplomatic assurances” are not formal or binding and as such are extremely unreliable.

The FOIA requests focus on individuals who were sent to countries following transfer from the United States and from Guantánamo Bay. The ACLU sued when the government did not respond to their FOIA request.  In November 2008, the American Civil Liberties Union and Columbia Law School's Human Rights Clinic released documents  revealing for the first time details of the U.S. government's process for transferring individuals to countries where they face a significant risk of being tortured. The documents  shed new light on the fundamentally flawed practice of "diplomatic assurances" or secret promises obtained from foreign governments that they will not torture the returned individuals. 

>>Learn more about the ACLU's work on issues of torture and detention.