THE US decision to ban torture may hinder the fight against terrorism, Attorney-general Philip Ruddock has said. Mr Ruddock's comments come as the US moves closer to putting Australian terrorist suspect David Hicks on trial – four-and-a-half years after he was captured by the US in Afghanistan. Hicks is now held in the US prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.In Washington to meet American officials about the US military commissions set up to trial terror suspects, Mr Ruddock said the US decision to ban torture as an interrogation method could make it more difficult to gather information about terrorism. "The point the United States has made is that it will not use torture and those instructions have been given to their agencies and that may well limit the capacity of intelligence organisations in the future," Mr Ruddock said on ABC TV.
Sleep deprivation, Mr Ruddock said, was not torture. "I don't regard sleep deprivation as torture, I've not heard it being put in that way."