Stephen Soldz makes the case for an independent investigation of psychologists’ aid to abusive interrogations. Join the effort to make it happen.

APA Ethics Policy-Maker Endorses Torture « Psychologists for Social Responsibility Blog.

FROM PsySR: The previously classified memos that the U.S. Justice Department released last week provide further details on the disturbing role that psychologists and other health professionals played in the systematic torture and abuse of prisoners detained by the U.S. You can read the four memos HERE

We quote below from a letter that President Barack Obama sent to the CIA, about the release of the memos:

“In releasing these memos, the men and women of the CIA have assurances from both myself, and from Attorney General Holder, that we will protect all who acted reasonably and relied upon legal advice from the Department of Justice that their actions were lawful. The Attorney General has assured me that these individuals will not be prosecuted and that the Government will stand by them.”

We urge our U.S. members to contact your representatives in Congress (Capitol Switchboard is 202-225-3121), the White House (202-456-1111), and the American Psychological Association Ethics Office (202-336-5930 or 800-374-2721), to share your concerns about the need for full investigation and disclosure, including the role played by psychologists and other health professionals, and for appropriate accountability.

The Washington Post- Psychologists Helped Guide Interrogations

President Obama has ordered an abrupt halt in the Gitmo Show Trials. From Peter Finn at the Washington Post:

In one of its first actions, the Obama administration instructed military prosecutors late Tuesday to seek a 120-day suspension of legal proceedings involving detainees at the naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba — a clear break with the approach of the outgoing Bush administration.

Obama Fulfills Promise: Starts Moving Quickly on Gitmo | PEEK | AlterNet

In an interview that aired today on Fox News Sunday, Bush admitted that he personally authorized the torture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

Bush: I Personally Authorized Torture | Rights and Liberties | AlterNet

In the Psychologists for Social Responsibility newsletter Stephen Soldz discusses the future path for the antitorture movement among psychologists.

Those of us who fought so hard against the Bush torture regime must now turn to the task of dismantling the many facets of abuse in our society. Psychologists can and should help transform a culture tolerant of abuse to one where abuse is unacceptable. 

The nation’s leading organization of psychiatrists says the Pentagon has reneged on an agreement not to use psychiatrists in interrogations of detainees at Guantanamo and other detention sites.

In a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Dr. Nada L. Stotland, president of the American Psychiatric Association, says, “The use of psychiatrists to aid in interrogations is a serious violation of medical ethics and should be discontinued.”

Psychiatrists Protest Pentagon Interrogations : NPR

The members of the American Psychological Association [APA] rejected the policies of their leadership, policies that abetted the Bush administration’s program of torture and detainee abuse. By a vote of 59%, the members passed a referendum stating that APA members may not work in U.S. detention centers that are outside of or in violation of international law or the U.S. Constitution “unless they are working directly for the persons being detained or for an independent third party working to protect human rights.” Passage of this referendum is a significant milestone in a years long effort by activist psychologists to change policies that encouraged participation in detainee interrogations because psychologists, the APA leadership claimed, helped keep those interrogations “safe, legal, and ethical.”

OpEdNews » Psychologists Reject the Dark Side: American Psychological Association Members Reject Participation in Bush Detention Ce

Members of the American Psychological Association have voted to prohibit consultation in the interrogations of detainees held at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, or so-called black sites operated by the Central Intelligence Agency overseas, the association said on Wednesday.

Psychologists Vote to End Interrogation Consultations – NYTimes.com

WASHINGTON — The petition resolution stating that psychologists may not work in settings where “persons are held outside of, or in violation of, either International Law (e.g., the UN Convention Against Torture and the Geneva Conventions) or the US Constitution (where appropriate), unless they are working directly for the persons being detained or for an independent third party working to protect human rights” was approved by a vote of the APA membership.  The final vote tally was 8,792 voting in favor of the resolution; 6,157 voting against the resolution.  To become policy, a petition resolution needs to be approved by a majority of those members voting.

Per the Association’s Rules and Bylaws, the resolution will become official APA policy as of the Association’s next annual meeting, which will take place in August 2009.  At that time, the APA Council of Representatives will also determine what further action may be necessary to implement the policy.

The approval of the petition resolution represents a significant change in APA’s policy regarding the involvement of psychologists in interrogations.  The petition resolution limits the roles of psychologists in certain defined settings where persons are detained to working directly for detainees or for an independent third party to protect human rights, or to providing treatment to other military personnel. 

This new petition resolution expands on the 2007 APA resolution, which called on the U.S. government to ban at least 19 specific abusive interrogation techniques, including waterboarding, that are regarded as torture by international standards.  The 2007 resolution also recognized that “torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment can result not only from the behavior of individuals, but also from the conditions of confinement,” and expressed “grave concern over settings in which detainees are deprived of adequate protection of their human rights.” 

APA will continue to call upon the Department of Defense and Congress to safeguard the welfare and human rights of detainees held outside of the United States and to investigate their treatment to ensure the highest ethical standards are being upheld. 

Psychologists and torture – The Boston Globe

Guantanamo-style interrogation is hard to square with the psychological association’s ethics code: “Psychologists strive to benefit those with whom they work and take care to do no harm.”

In the coming weeks, association members will vote on new leadership, and one candidate for president wants psychologists banned from participating in interrogations at US detention centers that violate human rights and do not adhere to the Geneva Conventions. Members are also voting on a resolution banning psychologists from working in such facilities “unless they are working directly for the persons being detained or for an independent third party working to protect human rights.”

These votes are providing association members with a chance to end any ambiguity about their profession’s abhorrence of abusive techniques. Many came out of the playbook of totalitarian states and could easily be used against US personnel in future clashes. Psychologists should leave no doubt they are opponents, and not enablers, of these methods.