Obama doesn't rule out charges over interrogations

By Caren Bohan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama left the door open on Tuesday to prosecuting some U.S. officials who laid the legal groundwork for harsh interrogation of terrorism suspects during the Bush administration.

Obama also said he would not necessarily oppose an effort to pursue a "further accounting" or investigation into the Bush-era interrogation program that included waterboarding, sleep deprivation, forced nudity, shoving people into walls and other methods.

The stance marked a shift for the Obama administration, which has emphasized it does not want to dwell on the past with lengthy probes into policies put in place by President George W. Bush after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Controversy has erupted across the political spectrum over last week's release by Obama of classified memos detailing the program to question al Qaeda suspects.

Human rights groups say the tactics such as waterboarding -- a form of simulated drowning -- constituted torture and violated U.S. and international laws.

In a question-and-answer session with reporters on Tuesday, Obama reiterated his vow not to prosecute CIA interrogators who relied in good faith on legal opinions from the Bush administration condoning the harsh methods.

However, Obama did not rule out charges against those who wrote the opinions justifying the methods used on captured terrorism suspects.

"With respect to those who formulated those legal decisions, I would say that is going to be more of a decision for the attorney general within the parameters of various laws, and I don't want to prejudge that," Obama said after meeting Jordan's King Abdullah.

"I think that there are a host of very complicated issues involved there," Obama said.

DIFFERING REMARKS

The comment seemed at odds with the position offered on Sunday by Obama's chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, who told ABC that the president did not believe the authors of the legal opinions should be prosecuted.

"Those who devised the policy, he believes that they were, should not be prosecuted either," Emanuel said, adding that it was not a "time for retribution."

When pressed by reporters on the contradiction, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs brushed aside questions on whether the president had had a change of heart.

"Instead of referring to what anybody might have said ... it's important to refer to what the president said," Gibbs said.

Human rights advocates and their supporters in the U.S. Congress want to expose and prosecute those responsible for abuses.