Allawi CIA/Torture - ContraCostaTimes.com | 01/30/2005 |

ContraCostaTimes.com | 01/30/2005 | Tough image cultivated by Allawi a hit with Iraqis:

"Critics have accused Allawi of positioning himself as 'Saddam lite.'

His background as a Baath Party operative until the 1970s, and then as a covert operative working with the CIA and British intelligence against Saddam, has exposed him to charges of possessing authoritarian tendencies.
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A Human Rights Watch report issued last week says that since Allawi's government took power in June, its police force has reverted to practices rife during Saddam's time: extreme torture of prisoners during interrogation, forced confessions, demands for exorbitant bribes to release prisoners detained without cause."