The Obama Administration on Wednesday brushed aside criticism from China, North Korea and other foreign governments that seized on a Senate report detailing harsh CIA interrogation tactics to accuse the U.S. of hypocrisy.
“We would put our record against any record around the world,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Wednesday, arguing the release of the report was a “rare and unique” demonstration of American transparency.
{mosads}“It points to the fact that you know we believe these techniques were contrary to our values as a nation, were overall detrimental,” Psaki said.
Chinese spokesperson Hong Lei said the U.S. should “reflect on” the contents of the report, calling for Washington to “correct its ways and earnestly respect and follow the rules of related international conventions,” according to The Guardian.
And North Korean state news agency KCNA said the report was evidence that the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), which is weighing whether to refer leaders in Pyongyang to the international criminal court in The Hague, was guilty of hypocrisy.
“If the UNSC handles the ‘human rights issue’ in the DPRK [North Korea] while shutting its eyes to the serious human rights issue in the US, one of its permanent members, while failing to settle the pending and urgent issues directly linked with the world peace and security, it will prove itself its miserable position that it has turned into a tool for US arbitrary practices just as everybody can hear everywhere,” the news service said in an editorial.
Psaki said that the report — and the decision by the Justice Department not to prosecute any of the CIA officials involved — would not complicate American calls for human rights across the globe.
“I think what we’d point to is that we’re willing to be transparent about our mistakes,” Psaki said. “We learn from them and we change. And our actions are evidence of that.”
Psaki also challenged critics to produce a similar accounting of their own actions.
“If other countries want to put out a report on their human rights practices, on their intelligence gathering practices, we’d certainly welcome that,” Psaki sad. “We haven’t seen that from anywhere in the world.”
She added that in conversations with foreign leaders and officials, the State Department was conveying that President Obama had ordered an end to any torture practices when he assumed offices.
“We’ll continue to convey that we ended this practice. It was one of the first steps the president made,” Psaki said. “We’re willing to be open and transparent about our mistakes and make changes.”