GERMANY: German interior minister Wolfgang Schäuble has said it is vital to prevent terrorist attacks using all intelligence available regardless of how it is obtained.
The remark has caused a huge row for Mr Schäuble, already under fire after admitting that German investigators have travelled to a Syrian prison and the US military prison in Guantánamo Bay in Cuba to interview German citizens who say they have been tortured.
"It would be completely irresponsible if we were to say that we don't use information where we cannot be sure that it was attained by conditions in line with the rule of law," said Mr Schäuble of the Christian Democrats (CDU). "We have to use this information."
At the same time, he said German investigators and secret service agents would "by no means" employ torture during interrogations or turn a blind eye to torture. But his remarks prompted the Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper to label him a latter-day Pontius Pilate.
The allegations of secret CIA flights transporting terrorism suspects across Europe to secret prisons for torture has been hotly debated in recent weeks, particularly after a German citizen went public with claims that he was mistakenly caught up in the process known as "extraordinary rendition".
But the man, Khaled el-Masri, is just one of several German citizens in this debate. Another is Mohammed Haidar Zammar, a German citizen of Syrian origin with suspected links to al-Qaeda and to Mohammed Atta, one of the September 11th pilots. He is being held in Far Filastin prison in Damascus, where human rights organisations say torture is commonplace. German investigators questioned him there three years ago.
Mr Murat Kurnaz from Bremen has been held without charge in Guantánamo Bay for the last four years where, his lawyer says, he has been mentally and sexually abused. He was questioned there by German intelligence officials in September 2002.
The German office of Human Rights Watch said the only reason German authorities should visit prisons like Guantánamo Bay is to end illegal imprisonment. Using information obtained from these prisons made Germany equally guilty, the organisaion said.
Mr Schäuble said he planned to tighten anti-terrorism laws to allow suspects to be brought to court on suspicion rather than firm evidence of terrorist activity. He rejected suggestions of cruel treatment in inhumane prisons, yesterday, saying that prisoners couldn't expect "a hotel room with a jacuzzi".
The use of information that may have been obtained through torture is at the centre of the current row. Last week it emerged that evidence justifying the war in Iraq may have been obtained through torture of a prisoner in an Egyptian jail.