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It’s not exactly the full-scale congressional inquiry Bush critics have long demanded. But some time fairly soon, members of the Senate Intelligence Committee are going to have an opportunity to grill a senior Central Intelligence Agency official in public and private about the agency’s controversial procedures for handling high-level terrorist suspects—and about the CIA’s efforts to thwart media leaks. [...]
In his current position as CIA senior deputy general counsel, and in his previous job as deputy general counsel for the agency’s Operations Division, which conducts clandestine and covert espionage activities, Rizzo was privy to key decisions and legal opinions rendered by CIA and other government lawyers regarding potentially contentious counterterror operations involving the agency, particularly following the 9/11 attacks. Aside from rendition, these operations include the CIA’s own use of aggressive, or “enhanced” interrogation techniques—including some alleged techniques that human-rights activists describe as torture—and the agency’s operation of what amounts to a secret network of detention centers where it is believed to be holding two to three dozen high-level Al Qaeda detainees...