Detainees held in Afghanistan by American troops have been routinely tortured and humiliated as part of the interrogation process, in the same way as those in Iraq, a Guardian investigation has found.
Five detainees have died in custody, three of them in suspicious circumstances, and survivors have told stories of beatings, strippings, hoodings and sleep deprivation.
The nature of the alleged abuse indicates that what happened at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq was part of a pattern of interrogation that has been common practice since the US invasion of Afghanistan.
Yesterday, in an attempt to stem charges that senior officials in the Bush admin-istration condoned the use of torture in the war on terror, the White House released hundreds of pages of documents outlining its internal deliberations on interrogation.
The memos, which originated at the Pentagon, the White House and the justice department and date from January 2002 to April last year, were intended to show that the president and his aides insisted that detainees at Guantánamo Bay should be treated humanely.
But one such memo leaked earlier this month said that Mr Bush had the legal authority to allow torture, giving new impetus to a campaign by human rights organisations and Democrats.
Senator Patrick Leahy, the Democratic member of the Senate subcommittee on foreign operations, told the Guardian that prisoners in Afghanistan "were subjected to cruel and degrading treatment, and some died from it".
"These abuses were part of a wider pattern stemming from a White House attitude that 'anything goes' in the war against terrorism, even if it crosses the line of illegality."
Five detainees have died in custody, three of them in suspicious circumstances, and survivors have told stories of beatings, strippings, hoodings and sleep deprivation.
The nature of the alleged abuse indicates that what happened at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq was part of a pattern of interrogation that has been common practice since the US invasion of Afghanistan.
Yesterday, in an attempt to stem charges that senior officials in the Bush admin-istration condoned the use of torture in the war on terror, the White House released hundreds of pages of documents outlining its internal deliberations on interrogation.
The memos, which originated at the Pentagon, the White House and the justice department and date from January 2002 to April last year, were intended to show that the president and his aides insisted that detainees at Guantánamo Bay should be treated humanely.
But one such memo leaked earlier this month said that Mr Bush had the legal authority to allow torture, giving new impetus to a campaign by human rights organisations and Democrats.
Senator Patrick Leahy, the Democratic member of the Senate subcommittee on foreign operations, told the Guardian that prisoners in Afghanistan "were subjected to cruel and degrading treatment, and some died from it".
"These abuses were part of a wider pattern stemming from a White House attitude that 'anything goes' in the war against terrorism, even if it crosses the line of illegality."
