Corrections

On pages 55-56 of the report we substituted Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld for Defense Department General Counsel William J. Haynes as it was Rumsfeld’s presence, not Haynes’ that was being considered during the meeting referenced, and Rumsfeld whom National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice suggested should be briefed, not Haynes. This change was made in the last sentence on page 55 and the first sentence on page 56. In the same section, we also changed the wording to make clear that according to the memorandum cited, National Security Council Legal Advisor John Bellinger was responding to a question from Vice President Dick Cheney when he stated that a full principals meeting, which would include Rumsfeld, Powell, and Bush, was not required to discuss details of the CIA program.

In the Summary section, on page 2 we changed the first sentence of the last paragraph from: “US officials who created, authorized, and implemented the CIA program should be among those investigated for conspiracy to torture as well as other crimes” to “US officials who played a role in the process of creating, authorizing, and implementing the CIA program should be among those investigated for conspiracy to torture as well as other crimes.” This edit better reflects the way the allegations are described in the body of the report.

An earlier version of this report stated that Amnesty International researchers found the remnants of a laser-guided bomb at the site of the Sawan airstrike. That was incorrect, the remnants were found at an earlier airstrike in the same neighborhood. The report has been corrected to remove reference to the bomb.

In an earlier caption of an image in the Abs/Kholan Prison section, we misidentified the remains of Abs/Kholan prison as the home of Omar Ali Farjain. The caption has been corrected accordingly.

A dispatch released on Oct 27, 2015 incorrectly said that the UN Security Council was meeting to discuss a report from the joint African Union-UN mission in Darfur that very day. The council was actually meeting to discuss the report the next day, Oct 28, 2015. 

An earlier version of this press release stated that the president has until October 17 to veto the bill or it becomes law. In fact, the President must either veto or sign the bill into law within 10 days (excluding Sundays) of Congress sending him the bill. The press release has been changed to reflect this. 

This press release originally incorrectly stated that Nasser bin Ghaith, an academic, was detained on August 19, 2015. He was detained on August 18. 

In the August 18, 2015 report, “Explicit Exclusion,” the organization Sign Language Education and Development requested Human Rights Watch remove a quote attributed to the organization on page 58. Human Rights Watch was informed that the quote reflects the organization’s experience with caregivers in school hostels, not teachers.

The Acknowledgments page was updated to acknowledge Advocate Bokankatla Malatji, disability rights commissioner, Lindiwe Mokate, basic education commissioner, and Omolara Akintoye, of the South African Human Rights Commission; and Nadi Albino, Director of Education, UNICEF South Africa.  

Hacking Team provided further comment to this release, which can be found here.

1/19/23: We have corrected footnotes 332, 333, and 337 of the online version of this report to indicate that a copy of the file in question was viewed by Human Rights Watch.

The original version of this report has been corrected and supplemented to reflect the correct name of Najibullah Najib (originally referred to as “Najibullah Kapisa”), the identification of Officer Zainab as a member of the Takhar Afghan National police (and not the NDS), and further details relating to the death of Shah Wali, including a document from his brothers attesting to his pre-existing cardiac condition and waiving any claim against the Takhar National Directorate of Security. References have accordingly been changed throughout this report.

An update to this news release, which stated that Yulian Tobai was the sixth fatality related to the December 8, 2014 Enarotali shootings, was incorrect. There are only five confirmed fatalities to the shootings.

Acknowledgments were not included in the original report, "Rights in Retreat, Abuses in Crimea" report published November 17, 2014. The report has now been updated to include an Acknowledgments section.

The November 2014 report, “Rights in Retreat: Abuses in Crimea,” incorrectly provided the number of cases documented by Human Rights Watch in which Crimean Tatars or pro-Ukraine activists were forcibly disappeared, abducted, or went missing as “at least 15 cases”. The correct number is 14.