[Livia]

Originally Posted by The Geordie Jesus

Can't help but feel like those are the empty words of a Director who needs to cover his ass though, I'd place more weight in the findings of a transparent and deeply researched report. I also doubt the US security services would be so understanding if a report surfaced like this about the Russian security services.

Fact is you cannot claim to be a beacon of human rights on the surface while carrying out stuff like this clandestinely. You either work within the law or you're above it. And when you are above it you can no longer preach it.

It's hard to be a beacon of human rights when people are trying to blow bits off of civilians in your country, or fly planes into your buildings, blow up buses and trains etc, and you think there might be something you can do to keep people safe. I really believe that if there are deeply researched reports about organisations like the CIA they need to be kept out of the public domain. If we want people to work to keep us safe in the face of appalling acts of terrorism, we have to trust them to do their job. I'm not saying they should not be accountable to their own government, but they should not have to account to the public because in the end it'll tie their hands in a way that would threaten national security.