US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in Kiev during her visit to Europe: "As a matter of US policy, the United States obligations under the [convention] which prohibits, of course, cruel and inhumane and degrading treatment, those obligations extend to US personnel wherever they are, whether they are in the United States or outside of the United States."
The US is signatory to the 1984 UN 'Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment or Punishment'. However due to the convention's ambiguity in wording; the definition of torture, cruel and degrading treatment in the US's interpretation excludes certain techniques.
One of the words exploited for it's ambiguity is 'severe'. The then Assistant US Attorney General Jay Bybee said in a memorandum on 1 August 2002, "the adjective 'severe' conveys that the pain or suffering must be of such a high level of intensity that the pain is difficult for the subject to endure." He postulated that "severe pain" would only be be strong enough if it causes organ failure or death! Such attitudes in American polity have potentially given American interrogators a 'green light' with the messages they send. What if an interrogator was inflicting pain of a 'non-severe' nature as defined by Jay Bybee, how would the interrogator know when it reaches the level of 'severe'? When an organ has failed? Death?
Reports on the ABC News network, quoting CIA sources, listed six "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques" currently accepted and used but not defined by them as torture.
1. Grabbing: Grabbing and shaking a suspect
2. Slapping: Inducing fear and pain.
3. Belly Slapping: Slapping the stomach, designed to cause pain but not injury.
4. Forced Standing: For many days chained to the floor, resulting in sleep deprivation, and causing sensory deprivation, used by the British in Northern Ireland until banned.
5. Naked Cold Water Dousing: Suspects are stripped naked and made to stand in cold cells and doused with cold water.
6. Water Boarding: suspects are bound to a board feet raised, and cellophane wrapped round their heads. Water is then poured onto the face resulting in fear of drowning.
It is now well known that the US has secret prison camps in eastern Europe, North Africa, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. But what goes on there? The need to locate outside of the US mainland is thought to be designed to avoid the US courts & justice system. It is also suspected that locating or moving suspects to countries like Egypt allows the US interrogators to have a 'hands off' approach to torture by outsourcing it to their Egyptian counterparts who have been well versed & trained by the CIA since the 50s in brutal torture techniques. To deny that US troops are involved in torture is spurious, but even if it were true, it doesn't address the issue of training and overseeing the Egyptian SS (Amanah Dowlah or State Security) or others doing the dirty work for you.
Further reading:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5197853/site/newsweek/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1659302,00.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4499528.stm