Bush's minions are accountable

US President Barack Obama has opened the possibility of prosecuting lawyers in the administration of George W. Bush who approved and authorised brutal interrogation and torture tactics used against terror suspects.

His move comes less than a week after he suggested it was time for the US to move on "from laying blame for the past".

The president's decision to investigate what he describes as the loss of America's "moral bearings" has drawn intense fire from former vice president Dick Cheney, who insists the methods helped protect the US. Cheney has also said that the publication of Justice Department memos detailing water boarding and physical abuse against detainees is a backward step by the Obama administration.

There can be no excuse for covering up the excesses of the Bush apparatchiks.

No civilised nation can decide to shelve the laws of natural justice in the interests of expediency. Civil rights are not subject to suspension as circumstances permit. Brutality cannot replace civility; decency and torture are not interchangeable.

The US knowingly operated a Gulag of secret prisons, detainees were tortured physically and psychologically, and the normal legal protection afforded to citizens was ignored. Those minions who facilitated this shift by applying an eraser to the Constitution need to be brought to justice.