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John Yoo, the controversial former Justice Department official, canceled a scheduled appearance at this week’s Federalist Society Convention in Washington D.C. The U.C. Berkeley law professor’s decision to not appear comes as he faces a growing chorus from those demanding accountability for the authoring of the so-called “torture memos” during the Bush Administration’s “war on terror.” Meanwhile, the Department of Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility has not yet released a report on its inquiry into possibly ethical violations committed by Yoo and other torture memo authors. The delay has prompted increasing pressure on Attorney General Eric Holder by those seeking full transparency and accountability on the torture issue. President Barack Obama, though reversing some of his predecessor’s policies, has continued with the so-called extraordinary rendition program while allowing for the DoD to suppress certain photos and documents related to torture. Jameel Jaffer is the Director of the ACLU’s National Security Project. Six years ago, Jaffer and his colleague Amrit Singh filed an historic Freedom of Information Act request to determine whether there was a pattern of torture in US-controlled prisons. That request and subsequent litigation was characterized earlier this year by the New York Times as “among the most successful in the history of public disclosure, with 130,000 pages of previously secret documents released”. Jameel Jaffer is the keynote speaker at an event this Sunday in Southern California called “Confronting US Sponsored Torture” and the co-author of “Administration of Torture: A Documentary Record from Washington to Abu Ghraib and Beyond.”

GUEST: Jameel Jaffer, litigator for the American Civil Liberties Union and Director of the ACLU National Security Project, co-author of the book “Administration of Torture: A Documentary Record from Washington to Abu Ghraib and Beyond.”

Jameel Jaffer will be speaking at:
The Islamic Institute of Orange County
Sunday, November 15th, 2:30-4:30 p.m.
1220 N. State College Boulevard, Anaheim Ca 92806
RSVP at info@shuracouncil.org or 714-239-6473