Studie des Institute on Medicine as a Profession zur Beteiligung von medizinischem Personal an Menschenrechtsbrüchen, November 2013 (engl. Originalfassung)
The 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States resulted in U.S. government-approved harsh treatment and torture of detainees suspected of having information about terrorism. Military and intelligence-agency physicians and other health professionals, particularly psychologists, became involved in the design and administration of that harsh treatment and torture—in clear conflict with established international and national professional principles and laws.
In 2010, the institute on Medicine as a Profession (IMAP) and the Open Society Foundations convened the Task Force on Preserving Medical Professionalism in National Security Detention Centers (Task Force) to examine what is known about the involvement of health professionals in infliction of torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment of detainees in U.S. custody and how such deviation from professional standards and ethically proper conduct occurred, including actions that were taken by the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and the CIA to direct this conduct.
The Task Force met regularly between December 2009 and January 2012. Its members authored and reviewed chapters and policy proposals for the group to consider. This report contains the Task Force’s analyses, findings, and recommendations. The report is based on information from unclassified, publicly available information. Where gaps in knowledge exist, we note that information is missing and discuss its importance and its potential impact on the issue assessed, as well as the value of further investigation. In a few instances, a member of the Task Force had personal knowledge of facts discussed, but consistent with an approach that relied on the public record, the report is not based on information obtained by any of its members in another capacity. Additionally, because of the professional roles they play, some members of the Task Force may have a personal stake in the report’s findings and conclusions; in such instances, we disclose that fact in the discussion. The Task Force sought consensus on findings and recommendations. Members agreed to approve the final product, however, even when they did not agree with every statement and recommendation […].
The Task Force has determined that actions taken by the U.S. government immediately following 9/11 included three key elements affecting the role of health professionals in detention centers:
1. The declaration that as part of a “war on terror,” individuals captured and detained in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and elsewhere were “unlawful combatants” who did not qualify as prisoners of war under the Geneva conventions. Additionally, the U.S. department of Justice approved of interrogation methods recognized domestically and internationally as constituting torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment.
2. The DoD and CIA’s development of internal mechanisms to direct the participation of military and intelligence-agency physicians and psychologists in abusive interrogation and breaking of hunger strikes. Although the involvement of health professionals in human rights violations against detainees progressed differently in the military and the CIA, both facilitated that involvement in similar ways, including undermining health professionals’ allegiances to established principles of professional ethics and conduct through reinterpretation of those principles.
3. The secrecy surrounding detention policies that prevailed until 2004–2005, when leaked documents began to reveal those policies. Secrecy allowed the unlawful and unethical interrogation and mistreatment of detainees to proceed unfettered by established ethical principles and standards of conduct as well as societal, professional, and nongovernmental commentary and legal review.
These key elements, as well as the task Force’s recommendations for remediating the participation of health professionals in detainee torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, are summarized below and addressed in detail in the body of this report.
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