Agency used \\\'abhorent\\\' methods: CIA chief

CIA Director John Brennan has said that some agency officers used "abhorrent" methods on detainees captured following the Sep 11 attacks and said it was "unknowable" whether harsh interrogation techniques yielded useful intelligence. With his agency under fire in the aftermath of a US Senate report detailing the CIA's use of torture on detainees after the 2001 attacks, Brennan rejected the report's conclusion that the agency had deceived the White House, Congress and the public about its interrogation programme. 'Our reviews indicate that the detention and interrogation programme produced useful intelligence that helped the United States thwart attack plans, capture terrorists and save lives,' Brennan told a news conference at the agency's Virginia headquarters. 'But let me be clear. We have not concluded that it was the use of EITs (enhanced interrogation techniques) within that programme that allowed us to obtain useful information from detainees subjected to them,' Brennan said. 'The cause-and-effect relationship between the use of EITs and useful information subsequently provided by the detainee is, in my view, unknowable,' he added, according to a news agency.