By Ali Sprott-Roen
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America
MASSACHUSETTS, United States – A just-released report from Physicians for Human Rights alleges that Bush-era CIA medical personnel conducted human research and experimentation on detainees in an attempt to provide legal cover for torture and to refine future torture techniques. This created the unintended consequence of placing the medical professionals involved in legal and ethical jeopardy.
There are domestic and international laws limiting human research and experimentation, based on both the post-World War II Nuremberg Code and American Common Rule, which ban experimentation on humans without informed consent.
“In an attempt to justify the war crime of torture, the CIA appears to have committed another alleged war crime — illegal experimentation on prisoners,” says Nathaniel Raymond, director of the PHR’s Campaign Against Torture and lead author of the report.
Allegedly illegal and unethical human research was conducted by medical staff in three ways, according to the report. First, they monitored and collected data on waterboarding. This lead to modifications of the procedure that resulted in “waterboarding 2.0,” which added saline to the water to avoid rendering detainees comatose or dead. Second, they studied interrogation techniques to determine the most effective tactics, whether in combination or over time, based on the susceptibility of the subject to severe pain. Third, they conducted sleep deprivation experiments, for up to 180 hours, in order to collect data to support future policies. The goal of this research and experimentation was to develop interrogation methods that remained within the limits established by government lawyers, while producing the maximum effect of the torture.
“There was no therapeutic purpose or intent to monitor and collect this data,” said Jonathan D. Moreno, professor of medical ethics at the University of Pennsylvania. Consequently, according to the report, medical professionals crossed the line from treating the detainees as patients to treating them as research subjects.
These conclusions were based on an analysis by Physicians for Human Rights of publicly released government documents and reports regarding the CIAs interrogation program, including previously classified documents released by President Obama between May 2009 and February 2010.
However, despite evidence of human experimentation and research, the government has not investigated any of the medical professionals involved in the interrogations.
According to Dr. Steven H. Miles, an expert on the role of medical professionals in torture, “There are countries that, over the years, have condemned medical complicity in torture in principle, but which haven’t really been willing to investigate medical professionals or hold them accountable,” and that includes the United States.
The CIA denies any wrongdoing, but Physicians for Human Rights is calling on President Obama to initiate a criminal investigation into the allegations and all agencies involved, and to prosecute the responsible parties if a crime is found. In addition, there is a strong demand for Congress to repeal changes made to the War Crimes Act in 2006 which allow for a more lenient definition of illegal experimentation on detainees.
Physicians for Human Rights seeks redress for past wrongdoing and prevention of future interrogation experimentation and research tactics, which its CEO, Frank Donaghue, calls “gross violations of humans rights law” and “a grave affront to America’s core values.”
For more information, please see:
Salon.com – PHR report: CIA personnel engaged in human experimentation – 7 June 2010
New York Times – Medical Ethics Lapses Cited in Interrogations – 6 June 2010
New Haven Register – Bush administration conducted torture research on detainees, report claims – 7 June 2010
HeraldSun – Doctors helped CIA perfect ‘torture” technique – 7 June 2010
NatureNews – Medics performed ‘interrogation research’ – 7 June 2010
