American Psychological Association angered many by choosing not to censure psychologist who took part in Guantánamo detainee’s torture

Enraged by the US professional psychologists association’s decision not to censure a colleague involved in torture at Guantánamo Bay, members of the association’s legislative body are planning a push to return the issue to its agenda during a biannual meeting that begins Friday.

Members of the council of representatives of the American Psychological Association (APA) acknowledge that adding to the agenda a proposed ban on the giving of professional support to military interrogations is an uphill struggle, and one that reopens a bitter internal debate they have thus far lost.

Still, members told the Guardian on Thursday that they nevertheless planned to introduce a resolution that would enforce a 2008 vote preventing psychologists from participating in military interrogations.

“APA is being perceived publicly as aloof to or not concerned enough about the torture issue,” said Scott Churchill, a University of Dallas psychologist who has served on the council of representatives since 2010.

During a three-day meeting that kicks off on Friday, Churchill plans to introduce a resolution that he described as a “proactive step” toward getting the APA to enforce a ban on torture that many members perceive to be insufficiently strong.

The operative text of that resolution, obtained by the Guardian, reads:

“The APA membership has voted to prohibit all psychologists from working at Guantánamo Bay, from the CIA black sites, and any other setting that the UN has declared to be in violation of international law excepting those psychologists who are performing no task other than offering treatment to fellow soldiers.

“Please inform psychologists who are performing any task other than offering treatment to fellow soldiers in these settings that they must immediately seek to deploy elsewhere or find themselves in violation of APA policy.”

Within the profession, attention has returned to the issue of psychologist support to abusive interrogations since the Guardian reported last month that the APA declined to censure a former army reserve major and psychologist, John Leso, who played a major role in torturing Guantánamo Bay detainee Mohammed al-Qahtani, whom the US suspects of being the intended 20th 9/11 hijacker.

The APA’s ethics committee has defended the lack of censure by saying it could not amass sufficient first-hand evidence tying Leso to participation in the Qahtani torture case, despite an extensive Senate report linking him to it.

Declining to rebuke Leso was “absolutely revolting to me,” said one council member who requested anonymity to speak before the three-day APA hearing in Washington.

“It’s obvious you don’t participate in this. It’s one of those things you learn in grad school – heck, even as an undergraduate.”

Both Leso’s case and the broader issue of psychologist support for military interrogations have been a bitter and divisive issue within the APA for much of the post-9/11 era. Ahead of the formal start to the hearing, APA communications chief Rhea Farberman told the Guardian that, as early as Thursday night, the organization will release more information about why it felt it had insufficient grounds to sanction Leso.

“It’s fair to say there’s been a mixed response,” Farberman said. “Those people we have briefed about our procedure, educating them about standard procedure that we followed, expressed a comfort level with the proceedings.”

A statement from the APA board of directors released at the meeting’s plenary session late Thursday specified several of the documents reviewed over seven years of inquiry into Leso, including the Sente report, two 2005 internal Defense Department investigations and two more from independent civil-society groups.

“It would be incorrect to draw any inference from the resolution of the Leso matter that APA is equivocal in condemning torture and abuse,” the statement read.

While the biannual meeting is likely to focus on routine professional issues, some psychologists described passions running high on both sides of the torture question.

“There is a group who is aghast, and there is also a group of loyalists who are [saying], ‘Why are we still talking about this, how can you question the great work of our wonderful ethics committee?’” said Stephen Soldz of the Coalition for an Ethical Psychology. “Both sides are mobilized.”

Yet the terrain is not equally favorable. Adding an item to the APA legislative body’s agenda will require Churchill to win the support of two-thirds of his 165 fellow representatives, a likelihood he described as a “crapshoot.”

Additionally, the council of representatives does not have formal control over the ethics committee, nor does it have the power to reopen the Leso inquiry. The representative who requested anonymity said those backing the anti-torture resolution hoped that the ethics committee would be influenced by the expressed sentiment of the council, but acknowledged lacking a direct institutional mechanism to compel a change.

While an option is available to return the issue to the APA agenda when the council next meets in August, Churchill said there was a sense of urgency behind the push.

“Six months is a long time for people who are on hunger strikes,” he said.