Lawyer: Spanish prosecution of Bush six lawyers will proceed

The Spanish lawyer working to indict six former Bush administration attorneys for their roles in the US’s torture program says the case will go ahead in Spanish courts.

Gonzalo Boyé, a private lawyer in Spain, is working to indict the so-called “Bush Six” lawyers who gave the Bush administration its rationale for carrying out the systematic torture of terrorist suspects. The six are former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, John Yoo, author of the “torture memos,” Douglas Feith, then a deputy defense secretary, Pentagon lawyer William Haynes II, former assistant attorney general Jay Bybee, and David Addington, a former chief of staff to then-Vice President Dick Cheney.

A recent decision by Spain’s parliament to re-work its “universal jurisdiction” rules (which allow human-rights crimes anywhere in the world to be prosecuted in Spanish courts) won’t stop the prosecution of six Bush administration lawyers, Boyé told Mother Jones magazine in an interview.

“Accountability is the first step toward deterrence,” Boyé told the magazine.

“With criminal offenses like this, it is necessary to send a clear message: No one is above the law, no matter their intentions. The security of any country can only exist within the rule of law. The war on terror is no exception.”
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