Secret CIA Interrogation Tapes Found Under Desk

The CIA has tapes of confessed 9/11 plotter Ramzi Binalshibh’s interrogation in a secret prison in Morocco, even though it has twice told the government that such tapes do not exist. The tapes, two video and one audio, were found in a box under a desk at the agency, and may be the only remaining recordings made within the clandestine prison system; the other 92 videos made at the secret prisons were destroyed, sources tell the AP.

The tapes were found in 2007, and a Justice Department prosecutor is investigating why they were never disclosed. Sources say the tapes don’t depict any torture, but they could be “extremely relevant” at Binalshibh’s eventual trial, his lawyer said, because they would help indicate his mental health—which has been rapidly deteriorating. The CIA has hinted at the videos' existence before, but downplayed their significance, saying they didn’t depict a CIA interrogation. But that’s a technicality; though Moroccans ran the prison, the CIA funded it and could oversee all interrogations. (More CIA stories.)