German Man Claims U.S. Tortured Him

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-CIA-Lawsuit.html?pagewanted=print

December 6, 2005

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 12:09 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A German man filed a lawsuit Tuesday claiming he was held captive and tortured by U.S. government agents after being mistakenly identified as an associate of the Sept. 11 hijackers.

Khaled El-Masri, who is being represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, said he was arrested while attempting to enter Macedonia for a holiday trip and flown to Afghanistan. During five months in captivity he was subjected to ''torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment,'' says a lawsuit he filed in U.S. District Court in suburban Alexandria, Va.

In Berlin, meanwhile, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the U.S. has acknowledged making a mistake in the man's arrest. ''I'm happy to say we have discussed the one case, which the government of the United States has of course accepted as a mistake,'' Merkel said. She spoke after meeting with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who refused later to discuss the case with reporters.

...

''I am asking the American government to admit its mistakes and to apologize for my treatment,'' El-Masri said in a statement. ''Throughout my time in the prison, I asked to be brought before a court but was refused. Now I am hoping that an American court will say very clearly that what happened to me was illegal and cannot be done to others.''

taken away and he was tortured.

is a tad tiny if he was tortured. The article says "at least" that amount. I wonder how he arrived at it.