Investigative journalist Ian Cobain argues that while the United Kingdom does not “participate in, solicit, encourage or condone” torture, when it’s faced with potential threats to national security, the rules change. His book A Secret History of Torture, shows how, from World War II to the War on Terror, the West has repeatedly and systematically resorted to torture, bending the law, and turning a blind eye. He draws on previously unseen official documents and the accounts of witnesses, victims and experts.

Mark Danner, frequent contributor to the New York Review of Books and author of Torture and Truth: America, Abu Ghraib, and the War on Terror, and A.O. Scott, New York Times chief film critic, discuss the film, the controversial torture scenes, and the experience of watching a film based on the recent past.

Katherine Bigelowe’s latest film "Zero Dark Thirty" comes out in limited release this week, but critics have already honed in on what’s become the film’s most controversial talking point: its depiction of torture. Karen Greenberg, director of the Center on National Security at Fordham Law School and editor of “The Torture Papers," explains.

This week’s press screening of "Zero Dark Thirty" has yielded a new headline about the controversial film: that the depicted use of torture to get to Bin laden is dangerously misleading. Brooke discusses the controversy with journalist Peter Bergen, the author of Manhunt: the 10 year search for Osama Bin Laden from 9/11 to Abbottabad.

Andrew Pekler - Here Comes The Night

We know that high value suspects like Khalid Sheikh Mohammad were waterboarded dozens and dozens of times. But new revelations by Human Rights Watch suggest many more people may have been waterboarded in the post 9/11 world than the CIA would have us believe.

Closing a controversial three-year investigation, Attorney General Eric Holder announced yesterday that no one will be prosecuted for harsh interrogation techniques carried out by the CIA that resulted in the deaths of two prisoners.

In 2003, an Egyptian terrorist suspect was abducted and flown to Egypt, where he says he was tortured and interrogated by the CIA. Years later, several Americans were indicted in Italy and found guilty in absentia for kidnapping. Now one has the chance to have her conviction overturned.

High-profile cases, where the punishment doesn't seem to fit the crime, are part of what Glenn Greenwald calls America's two-tiered justice system. That's the focus of his book, now out in paperback, "With Liberty and Justice for Some." 

Human Rights Watch has published details of what it says is a state policy of torture in Syria that amounts to a crime against humanity. It documents the locations of detention facilities and outlines the methods of torture used in them.

According to a report by the UN's Secretary General as part of the UN's annual report on children and armed conflict, the Syrian government is torturing children and using them as human shields. The report is also critical of opposition forces in Syria and accuses the Free Syrian Army of recruiting children. Radhika Coomaraswamy is the UN's Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict.

Nada Dhaif, a Bahraini oral surgeon, one of the 20 medical personnel sentenced to prison after treating pro-democracy demonstrators, talks about the appeal of her 15-year sentence and her work on behalf of fellow torture victims.

Using the 14th amendment as their basis, many courts have treated corporations as people. Usually these rulings are beneficial to corporations and their larger interests, such as in the Supreme Court decision that allows corporations to endorse candidates like individuals. However, a new case will determine whether or not a corporation can be convicted as an accomplice to a crime against humanity. In Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum, Royal Dutch Petroleum and its subsidiary, Shell, are accused of aiding an autocratic regime that brutalized minorities in an oil-rich region of Nigeria.

Ten years ago today, President George W. Bush signed a two-page memorandum called "Humane Treatment of Taliban and al Qaeda Detainees." The memorandum, drafted in part by John Yoo, is now best known as the first of the so-called "terror memos." It argued that the government was exempt from the Geneva Conventions in any war on terror-related investigations, as, the document asserts, the treaty refers only to "High Contracting Parties."

Detainees in prisons run by the Afghanistan National Police and the country's intelligence service are routinely abused and subjected to what a new report from the United Nations refers to as "systematic torture." The report details repeated beatings, electric shocks, the use of stress positions and the threat of sexual assault. It is unknown whether American officials were aware of or complicit in the abuse.

Irish choreographer John Scott and performers Kiribu and Nina Oiplea discuss “Fall and Recover.” Based on the experiences and stories of survivors of torture in Africa, Asia, and Romania, the work emerges from workshops with clients of The Centre for Care for Survivors of Torture, which is located in Dublin, Ireland. Two Irish dancers perform with a cast of 11 torture survivors from nine countries-- Kiribu is from eastern Africa and Nina Oiplea is from Eastern Europe. “Fall and Recover” opens at La MaMa’s Ellen Stewart Theatre March 25.