Those assurances are worthless, and the Bush administration surely knows it. In normal times, the governments of these countries have abysmal standards for human rights and humane treatment, and would have no problem promising that a prisoner wouldn’t be tortured—right before he was tortured. And these are not normal times.111 The Bush administration, however, has continued to defend the practice of relying on assurances against torture, even from the government of Uzbekistan, a country in which torture is systematic.112 At a press conference on March 16, 2005, President George W. Bush stated that one way to protect the American people and their friends from attack post-September 11 was “to arrest people and send them back to their country of origin with the promise that they won't be tortured.” 113 In response to a reporter’s follow-up question, “…what is it that Uzbekistan can do in interrogating an individual that the United States can't?” the President simply responded, “We seek assurances that nobody will be tortured when we render a person back to their home country.”114 No Effective Opportunity to Challenge Reliability of Assurances The most glaring deficiency in U.S. law and policy lies precisely in the absence of express provision for procedural guarantees for the person subject to transfer, including any opportunity to challenge the credibility or reliability of diplomatic assurances before an independent judicial body. This deficiency applies with equal force to immigration cases, which are governed by the procedures set forth in federal regulations; to renditions outside of any legal framework, which lack even the basic and flawed process set forth in the immigration regulations; and to returns from any place of detention within U.S. jurisdiction or effective control, including Guantánamo Bay. 111 Editorial, “Torture by Proxy,” New York Times, March 8, 2005. See also Editorial, “Torture by Proxy,” Los Angeles Times, March 11, 2005, p. B-12: “The CIA says with a straight face that it gets those assurances before delivering suspects to jailers in Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Pakistan—countries that have such abysmal human rights records that promises of decent treatment are a joke.” See also Dana Priest, “CIA’s Assurances on Transferred Suspects Doubted; Prisoners Say Countries Break No-Torture Pledges,” Washington Post, March 17, 2005, p. A1. 112 The 2004 U.S. Department of State Country Reports on Human Practices documents the following types of torture at the hands of the Uzbek authorities: suffocation, electric shock, rape and sexual abuse, beatings. The country report also referenced a February 2003 report by the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture, which concluded that torture or similar ill-treatment was systematic. See Report of the Special Rapporteur on Torture, Mission to Uzbekistan, E/CN.4/2003/68/add.2, February 3, 2003 [online] http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G03/107/66/PDF/G0310766.pdf?OpenElement (retrieved March 19, 2005). 113 Press Conference by the President, March 16, 2005 [online] http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/03/20050316-2.html (retrieved March 19, 2005). 114 Ibid. HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH VOL. 17 NO. 4(D) 38