US doctors accused over Guantánamo abuse

[emad]

Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington
Friday January 7, 2005
The Guardian

Doctors at Guantánamo Bay and Abu Ghraib used their medical knowledge to help devise coercive interrogation methods for detainees including sleep deprivation, stress positions and other abuse, it was reported yesterday.

An article in the New England Journal of Medicine provides the most authoritative account so far that doctors were active participants in the abuse of prisoners in America's "war on terror".

"Clearly, the medical personnel who helped to develop and execute aggressive counter-resistance plans thereby breached the laws of war," says the article, which is based on interviews with more than two dozen military personnel and recently released official documents. It adds: "The conclusion that doctors participated in torture is premature, but there is probable cause for suspecting it."

The issue that the administration had encouraged the use of coercive interrogation techniques was raised yesterday in the Senate confirmation hearings of Alberto Gonzales, the presidential nominee for attorney general. Mr Gonzales was attacked for a memo which said only the most severe types of torture were not permissible under US law.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/guantanamo/story/0,13743,1385095,00.html

[wtmusic]

1. Breeding a new generation of Mengeles

All part of the war on terra.

[emad]

2. Docs and shrinks designing torture:

"This is physicians and psychiatrists being involved in the design and implementation of interrogation plans," said Jonathan Marks, a British barrister and fellow at the Georgetown University law centre, who co-authored the report.

There was no comment from the US military yesterday, but the article includes comments from the deputy assistant secretary of defence for health, David Tornberg, which suggest the Pentagon believes professional ethics do not apply in a time of war. That view has raised concern in the medical community. "You have to protect physicians from being ... used to serve military purposes," said Leonard Rubinstein, director of Physicians for Human Rights.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/guantanamo/story/0,13743,1385095,00.html

[sueh]

3. Looks like these doctors

need a taste of their own medicine.