Obama completes national security team
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Promising to protect the United States while adhering to its core human values, President-elect Barack Obama formally unveiled his intelligence team Friday, praising their integrity, management skills and willingness to tell him the truth.
"We must adhere to our values as diligently as we protect our safety with no exceptions," Obama said.
Obama picked retired Adm. Dennis Blair as the national intelligence director and Leon Panetta to head the CIA.
He called them "public servants with unquestioned integrity, broad experience, and strong managers with the core pragmatism that we need in dangerous times."
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Obama said he has given the men the clear charge to restore the United States' record on human rights.
"I was clear throughout this campaign and was clear throughout this transition that under my administration the United States does not torture. We will abide by the Geneva Conventions. We will uphold our highest ideals," he said.
Obama also tapped John Brennan to coordinate counterterrorism policy for the White House National Security Council.
(Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
