Amnesty International is criticizing European leaders for accepting Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s recent explanation U.S. interrogators are forbidden to use torture both at home and abroad. The issue followed Rice throughout a trip to several European countries this week amid allegations the CIA has used European airports to transfer detainees and is also running a secret prison in a former Soviet state. European leaders had hailed Rice’s comments as a major shift in US policy. Natacha Kazatchkine, Amnesty International’s top officer for human rights in Europe, said: “The European Union, as a Union of States, must reaffirm that they do not accept any practise violating the international convention on torture, and they have to explain what occured, and be all transparent on information we recently heard about this case.”