inhuman and degrading treatment and torture under the United Nations Convention against Torture, and Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. In May 2005, three months after Gonzales became attorney general, Steven G. Bradbury of the Office of Legal Counsel issued a pair of classified opinions that, for the first time, provided Central Intelligence Agency explicit authorization to apply to terror suspects a variety of painful physical and psychological interrogation methods, either alone or in combination. The approved techniques included striking a prisoner, exposure to extreme temperatures, stress positions, walling, sleep deprivation for up to 180 hours ( days), and the simulated drowning procedure known as "waterboarding". These secret memos superseded a previous, unclassified legal opinion that declared torture "abhorrent." Nevertheless, the classified opinions claimed that their reasoning and conclusions were based upon and fully consistent with the previous legal opinion. Gonzales reportedly approved the May 10, 2005, classified legal memoranda over the policy objections of James B. Comey, the outgoing deputy attorney general, who told colleagues at the Justice Department that they would all be "ashamed" when the world eventually learned of it. Patrick Leahy and John Conyers, chairmen of the respective Senate and House Judiciary Committees, requested that the Justice Department turn over documents related to the classified 2005 legal opinions to their committees for review. In 2009, The Obama administration stated it would abide by the Geneva Convention and described some of the enhanced interrogation techniques established under Attorney General Gonzales's tenure as torture. On January 22, 2009, President Obama signed an executive order requiring the CIA to use only the 19 interrogation methods outlined in the United States Army Field Manual on interrogations "unless the Attorney General with appropriate consultation provides further guidance.") Bradbury's memoranda were publicly released by the Obama Administration on April 16, 2009. Objectivity Gonzales had a long relationship with former president George W. Bush. Gonzales served as a general counsel when Bush was the governor of Texas. Such relationship made critics question whether he would maintain independence in his administration of the U.S. Department of Justice. Gonzales has been called Bush's "yes man." Even though the advice given by Gonzales was based and supported by other lawyers, specifically the Department of Justice, charged by statute to provide legal advice to the President, critics claim that Gonzales gave only the legal advice Bush wanted. Critics questioned Gonzales's ethics and professional conduct.