Center for Victims of Torture

CHICAGO, July 18 -- On June 25, 2008, the Center for Victims of Torture, the National Religious Campaign Against Torture, and Evangelicals for Human Rights launched the Campaign to Ban Torture: American Voices for American Values. Today, we are happy to announce that the Midwest Coalition for Human Rights has officially endorsed the campaign.

“No act of war, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification for torture"

On June 25, the eve of International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, the Center for Victims of Torture, the National Religious Campaign Against Torture, and Evangelicals for Human Rights, launched the Campaign to Ban Torture: American Voices for American Values.

WASHINGTON, June 25 - A bipartisan group of 200 former government officials, retired generals and religious leaders plans to issue a statement on Wednesday calling for a presidential order to outlaw some interrogation and detention practices used by the Bush administration over the last six years.

The executive order they seek would commit the government to using only interrogation methods that the United States would find acceptable if used by another country against American soldiers or civilians.

View this educational guide on the damaging effects of Psychological Torture.

Eight Lessons of Torture is an educational guide developed by the Center for Victims of Torture that discusses the use of torture and cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment by the U.S.

NOV. 28 - Coalition partners are concluding a six-month initiative in Iowa working to raise awareness of the issues surrounding U.S. interrogation policy and torture and abuse suffered at the hands of U.S. officials. With the first-in-the-nation presidential caucus just weeks away, there is no doubt that Iowans will play a unique and important role in shaping the national dialogue on this vital issue.

The Wall Street Journal (November 7, 2007) ran an Op-Ed by Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz regarding the Democrats apparent soft stance on torture. The Executive Director of the Center for Victims of Torture, Douglas A. Johnson, wrote a response to Mr. Dershowitz editorial and it was printed in the November 12th issue of the WSJ. The text of his letter can be found below:

Alan Dershowitz, while passionately promoting the use of torture, consistently fails to acknowledge how torture really works in the world. His argument is based on a dramatic but purely hypothetical law school exercise.