Tortured Source of False Intel in Colin Powell's UN Speech Dies in Apparent "Suicide"

As the story starts to get clearer and clearer everyday since the release of the Torture Memos we get an interesting little coincidence. The high-value detainee that was never transferred to Guantanimo, Ibn al-Sheikh al-Libi died in an apparent suicide in a Libyan prison. According to the Washington Post:

Libi was captured fleeing Afghanistan in late 2001, and he vanished into the secret detention system run by the Bush administration. He became the unnamed source, according to Senate investigators, behind Bush administration claims in 2002 and 2003 that Iraq had provided training in chemical and biological weapons to al-Qaeda operatives. The claim was most famously delivered by then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell in his address to the United Nations in February 2003.

Powell later called the speech a "blot" on his record, saying he was not given all available intelligence and analysis within the government. The Defense Intelligence Agency and some analysts at the CIA had questioned the veracity of Libi's testimony, which was obtained after the prisoner was transferred to Egyptian custody for questioning by the CIA, according to Senate investigators.

But why was al-Libi not transferred to Guantanimo Bay where Dick Cheney said we were sending "the worst of the worst"? Back to the Post:

"I would speculate that he was missing because he was such an embarrassment to the Bush administration," said Tom Malinowski, the head of the Washington office of Human Rights Watch. "He was Exhibit A in the narrative that tortured confessions contributed to the massive intelligence failure that preceded the Iraq war."

With the recent release of the Torture Memos preceding the "suicide" of a high value detainee who was tortured into giving false testimony, I tell you something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

Interesting how close "al-Libi" is to "alibi".