The harsh treatment of prisoners continues to haunt the Bush Administration. Today, an e-mail from the FBI claims that President Bush personally approved the use of abusive methods of questioning detainees held at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. The White House denies all such allegations.

'People need to be held accountable and brought to justice if they're involved in wrongdoing,' said White House spokesman Scott McClellan. 'Preventive measures and corrective measures must be put in place to prevent it from happening again.'

The e-mails came to light due to a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union which unearthed them under the Freedom of Information Act. The e-mail refers to an executive order allegedly signed by the president which, according to the ACLU, 'states the President directly authorised interrogation techniques including sleep deprivation, stress positions, the use of military dogs, and sensory deprivation through the use of hoods.'

The memo also claims the FBI opposed many of the methods of interrogation supposedly approved by President Bush.

The Bush Administration has come under harsh international criticism for its treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and at Abu Ghrahib prison near Bahgdad. It has treated the prisoners at Gitmo as 'enemy combatants' and not as prisoners of war who are entitled to protections under the Geneva Conventions.

According to another document released by the ACLU, the FBI indicated in an 'Urgent Report' that they had 'observed numerous physical abuse incidents of Iraqi civilian detainees', including 'strangulation, beatings, and placement of lit cigarettes into the detainees' ear openings' at Abu Ghrahib.

Other tactics described in the reports included using extreme heat, coldness, keeping detainees in shackles for up to 24 hours at a time, allowing detainees to deficate or urinate on themselves, forcing detainees to view pornography, listen to loud rap music or draping them in Israeli flags.