CIA torture 'did not help capture Bin Laden'

Osama Bin Laden pictured in 2001. Credit: Reuters

The CIA's torture techniques did not aid the discovery and killing of Osama Bin Laden, a report published today has indicated.

According to the report from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, the most accurate information on a courier that eventually led authorities to Bin Laden was gathered from a detainee before controversial "enhanced interrogation techniques" were used.

The report cited one CIA officer, who said Hassan Ghul "sang like a tweetie bird" immediately after he was taken into US custody in 2004.

Ghul's testimony relating to Abu Ahmad al-Kuwaiti - an al-Qaeda member and Bin Laden's courier - was seen as key to the raid on the 9/11 mastermind's Pakistan compound in 2011.

A grab from a video found in Osama Bin Laden's compound in Pakistan. Credit: Reuters

The CIA, however, takes issue with the report's claims, and insists that its intel gathered from the programme of enhanced interrogation techniques was key.

As an example, it says that information from detainees about al-Kuwaiti "fundamentally changed our assessment of his potential importance to our hunt for Bin Laden".