EDITORIAL
Torture is illegal, whether home, abroad

President Bush pledged on U.N. Torture Victims Recognition Day last week that the United States will not torture terrorism suspects.

And we'd have an easier time celebrating that pledge if there weren't so many questions about the treatment of those held captive in the amorphous war against terrorism.

Lest anyone forget, torture is illegal under U.S. and international law. The United States signed the Convention Against Torture in 1994, which opposes torture overseas and at home and considers all acts of torture criminal offenses under domestic legislation.

Yet a recent Justice Department report says there have been abuses of suspects detained on visa and other immigration violations since Sept. 11. And just because prisoners are not physically on American soil, like those detained at Guantanamo Bay, that doesn't mean the U.S. is above the law.

Sources have told The Washington Post, for example, that U.S. authorities sometimes transfer uncooperative suspects to countries where security services use brutality to extract information. One such place is the secret CIA interrogation center at Bagram air base north of Kabul, where the deaths of two Afghan detainees are under investigation.

Sending suspects abroad to be tortured is just as bad as inflicting cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment at home.