Hearing set on interrogations

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse announced today that the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts will hold the first public congressional hearing on the Bush administration's interrogation of terrorist suspects since the Obama administration last month released legal memos authorizing harsh techniques.

His office said the hearing next Wednesday will focus on the legal analysis used to authorize harsh interrogation techniques, the ineffectiveness of those techniques, and the standards governing lawyers’ professional conduct applicable to those who authorized the procedures.

The witnesses are scheduled to be Ali Soufan, a former FBI supervisory special agent, and Philip Zelikow, a former lawyer at the State Department.

Their mini-biographies, provided by the subcommittee, are below:

Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, is among those calling for a full investigation of the interrogation practices. So far, President Obama has opposed such a move, and has made clear that those who carried out questioning based on the authorizing memos will not be prosecuted.

The president is leaving up to Attorney General Eric Holder whether to prosecute the lawyers who wrote the memos. News reports late Tuesday said that an internal Justice Department investigation is not recommending criminal prosecutions, though the lawyers could be referred for ethical violations.

At the FBI, Ali Soufan investigated and supervised highly sensitive and complex international terrorism cases, including the East Africa Bombings, the attack on the USS Cole, and the events surrounding 9/11. He has interrogated senior members of Al-Qa’ida, and objected to the use of the abusive tactics authorized in the OLC memos. He is now CEO of the Soufan Group LLC. Mr. Soufan received undergraduate degrees in International Studies and Political Science from Mansfield University of Pennsylvania and his master’s from Villanova University.

Philip Zelikow is White Burkett Miller Professor of History at the University of Virginia. While serving in the Bush Administration, Professor Zelikow wrote a memorandum, which the Administration ordered to be destroyed, objecting to the reasoning outlined in the OLC memos. He has also served as executive director of the 9/11 Commission, and worked on the staff of the National Security Council for the first Bush administration. Professor Zelikow received his baccalaureate degree from the University of Redlands, a law degree from the University of Houston, and his master's and Ph.D. from the Fletcher School at Tufts University.