C.I.A. Worker Says Message on Torture Got Her Fired
By MARK MAZZETTI
New York Times
WASHINGTON, July 21 — A contract employee working for the Central Intelligence Agency said she had been fired recently for posting a message on a classified computer server that said an interrogation technique used by the agency against some terror suspects amounted to torture.
The employee, Christine Axsmith, kept the “Covert Communications” blog on a top-secret computer network used by American intelligence agencies. Ms. Axsmith was fired on Monday after C.I.A. officials objected to a message that criticized the interrogation technique called “waterboarding,” a particularly harsh practice that the C.I.A. is known to have used on Khalid Sheik Mohammed, who is widely regarded as the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.
The episode has opened a window into the new world of classified blogging: an experimental effort being carried out in top-secret computer forums where information and ideas are shared across the intelligence community. Intelligence officials said that since last year, more than 1,000 blogs had been set up on classified intelligence servers.
Ms. Axsmith, a computer security expert with a law degree, posted the message this month, shortly after the Bush administration decided to grant some protections of the Geneva Conventions to suspected terrorists in American custody. She said that her message began, “Waterboarding is torture, and torture is wrong.”
Ms. Axsmith’s firing was earlier reported on several blogs including Wonkette.com on Thursday, and in Friday’s Washington Post.
“I wanted an in-house discussion,” Ms. Axsmith said in an interview on Thursday in her home in Washington. “Something where I would be educating people on the background of the Geneva Conventions.”
Instead, Ms. Axsmith was fired by her employer, B.A.E. Systems, which has an information technology contract with the C.I.A.
(The rest is here.)
New York Times
WASHINGTON, July 21 — A contract employee working for the Central Intelligence Agency said she had been fired recently for posting a message on a classified computer server that said an interrogation technique used by the agency against some terror suspects amounted to torture.
The employee, Christine Axsmith, kept the “Covert Communications” blog on a top-secret computer network used by American intelligence agencies. Ms. Axsmith was fired on Monday after C.I.A. officials objected to a message that criticized the interrogation technique called “waterboarding,” a particularly harsh practice that the C.I.A. is known to have used on Khalid Sheik Mohammed, who is widely regarded as the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.
The episode has opened a window into the new world of classified blogging: an experimental effort being carried out in top-secret computer forums where information and ideas are shared across the intelligence community. Intelligence officials said that since last year, more than 1,000 blogs had been set up on classified intelligence servers.
Ms. Axsmith, a computer security expert with a law degree, posted the message this month, shortly after the Bush administration decided to grant some protections of the Geneva Conventions to suspected terrorists in American custody. She said that her message began, “Waterboarding is torture, and torture is wrong.”
Ms. Axsmith’s firing was earlier reported on several blogs including Wonkette.com on Thursday, and in Friday’s Washington Post.
“I wanted an in-house discussion,” Ms. Axsmith said in an interview on Thursday in her home in Washington. “Something where I would be educating people on the background of the Geneva Conventions.”
Instead, Ms. Axsmith was fired by her employer, B.A.E. Systems, which has an information technology contract with the C.I.A.
(The rest is here.)
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