2006年VOA标准英语-US President Signs Law on Detainee Questioning

（单词翻译）

By Scott Stearns
White House
17 October 2006

		President Bush is seen after signing the Military Commissions Act of 2006, Oct. 17, 2006

U.S. President George Bush has signed into a law a series of new rules for interrogating¹ suspected terrorists and bringing them to trial. Critics say the measure violates defendants²' civil liberties.

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The law authorizes³ a previously-secret interrogation program by the Central Intelligence Agency that President Bush says is one of the nation's most important tools in fighting terrorism.

"This bill spells out specific, recognizable offenses⁴ that would be considered crimes in the handling of detainees so that our men and women who question captured terrorists can perform their duties to the fullest extent of the law," Mr. Bush says.

The Bush administration first acknowledged that program six weeks ago when it transferred suspects from CIA custody⁵ to a military detention⁶ center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Leading members of the president's political party raised concerns about the treatment of those held by the CIA, blunting Republican hopes of using the debate to portray⁷ opposition⁸ Democrats¹⁰ as weak on terror.

The new law is something of a compromise as it protects detainees from abuses including rape¹¹, torture, and practices deemed cruel and inhuman¹².

President Bush says it reflects both the spirit and the letter of America's international treaty obligations, including the Geneva Convention.

"The United States does not torture," Mr. Bush says. "It is against our laws and it is against our values.  By allowing the CIA program to go forward, this bill is preserving a tool that has saved American lives."

The law also authorizes military commissions that President Bush proposed following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

The U.S. Supreme¹³ Court ruled that President Bush could not create those commissions by Executive Order.  Instead they must be explicitly¹⁴ authorized¹⁵ by Congress.

Now that they are, President Bush says it sends a clear message to terrorists that America will answer brutal¹⁶ murder with patient justice.

"These military commissions will provide a fair trial in which the accused are presumed innocent, have access to an attorney, and can hear all the evidence against them," Mr. Bush says. "These military commissions are lawful¹⁷, they are fair, and they are necessary."

Critics of the law say it gives prosecutors¹⁸ too much power by allowing coerced¹⁹ testimony²⁰ as evidence and denying defendants the ability to challenge their detention.

In a written statement, Senator Patrick Leahy, the ranking Democrat⁹ on the Judiciary Committee, called the bill signing a sad day because the law, in his words, undercuts American freedoms and is being used by the president for political purposes to avoid accounting²¹ for what Leahy calls the administration's unlawful actions.