Berwick-Linked Advocacy Group Spearheaded ‘Torture’ Campaign against American Officials
President Obama’s recess appointment of Donald Berwick to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has sparked controversy for, among other reasons, Berwick’s connections to the Massachusetts-based advocacy group Physicians for Human Rights (PHR). Critics like Robert Goldberg, writing in the American Spectator, have pointed to PHR’s harsh criticisms of Israel in connection with counter-terror operations in the West Bank and Gaza. But it is not only Israel that the group has accused of serious human rights violations. It has also leveled such accusations against the United States.
Physicians for Human Rights has indeed played a pivotal role in the campaign to prosecute American officials for alleged acts of torture committed at the Guantánamo Bay prison camp and at other detention centers employed in the war on terror. In June 2008, at a time when this campaign was reaching a fever pitch, Physicians for Human Rights issued a highly publicized report titled “Broken Laws, Broken Lives” and subtitled “Medical Evidence of Torture by U.S. Personnel and Its Impact.” According to a PHR press release, Donald Berwick became a member of the organization’s board of directors just over six months earlier, in November 2007.
The PHR “Broken Laws, Broken Lives” report claims to document what it calls the “systematic use of torture by the United States.” The methodology of the report is, above all, notable for the exceptionally broad notion of “torture” employed, including non-physical “psychological torture.” An earlier PHR report is exclusively devoted to the “Systematic Use of Psychological Torture by U.S. Forces.”
The standards employed by Physicians for Human Rights in conducting its investigation derive from the so-called “Istanbul Protocol,” a set of “guidelines” for “investigating” and “documenting” torture charges that has been promoted by the European Union. Physicians for Human Rights has been one of the principal international partners in a long-term EU-funded project to foster the use of the Istanbul Protocol.
In 2003, the European Commission provided an initial grant of nearly €900,000 to fund a so-called “Istanbul Protocol Implementation Project” conducted under the auspices of the Copenhagen-based International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (IRCT). Physicians for Human Rights was one of four international partner organizations involved in the project. European Commission data show that the EU grant accounted for nearly 80% of the total costs.
Thats just great. They target governments right? So do they say ANYTHING about beheadings that terrorist groups seem to love to do? Human Rights violations? Try the mexican border of the US.. people being tortured and killed there every day. How about Honor Killings.. lots of torture there, beating a woman for a while, stomping on her, then strangling her or stoning her until she dies. They could never mention these things though, because the people doing these horrid acts are the very people they say are the poor sainted victims.
Yes they target governments for the most part because governments are subject to international pressure and public opinion. Terrorists don’t really care whether people like them so it would be pointless to write an article decrying their human rights violations wouldn’t it? Here are a couple of things from their archives about women’s rights and asylum seeking, honor killing is mentioned specifically.
http://physiciansforhumanrights.org/library/2003-02-26.html
http://physiciansforhumanrights.org/library/the-talibans-war-on-women.html
It’s a pretty good archive and very easy to search so the only conclusion I can draw is that you didn’t bother to even look at their webpage before writing your little screed.
While I’m sure you meant to simply help me out with more information you sure did sound like you were looking down your nose at me while you wrote your reply to my “little screed” I’m sure it makes you feel better to educate the philistines, thanks for the info. I won’t be posting on PJM again though, people like Paul seem to take delight in making others feel small for writing what they feel. If I wanted to research it I would have, 100 percent of my comments are off the cuff. I can be an internet scholar with the best of them if I felt like it. Again, thanks for the uplifting comment Paul, hope you feel better for it.
It’s so nice to know that America is once again being investigated for such things as “psychological torture,” while our enemies, as Brian Maxson rightly mentioned, are beheading Americans.
Maybe it’s time that we investigate the radical Muslim terrorists for their cruel and unusual treatment of their women and foreign troops and people?
Oh, that’s right, if you do that, then it will be claimed that you’re a racist suffering from Islamophobia.
Remember the good old days when we could go after our enemies without any type of backlash?
Waterboarding of 3 known terrorists with extremely valuable information is obviously torture. Quadrupling the number of drone attacks in the Middle East, killing innocents and possible terrorists without extracting any information whatsoever is just dandy. Hope and Change and a MSM without a lick of sense.
Geneva Conventions. Look it up.
…. Yah, Paul …. Good Idea….
Geneva Conventions require: …
1 – Combatants to be in UNIFORM and OPENLY carrying their Arms. This prevents civilians from being mistaken as combatants….
2 – Combatants cannot intermingle with civilians, thereby endangering the civilians …
3 – Storage of munitions and armaments in any structure makes them legitimate military targets….
4. – Prisoners must be treated humanely, allowed contact with organizations such as the International Red Cross. ….. They may not be beheaded and otherwise tortured. …
5. – Tossing bombs at gatherings of civilians – weddings, funerals, market places – is a complete violation of the Geneva Conventions. …
Thanks again for suggesting I look up the Geneva Conventions.
How about the human rights violation of saddling a couple of generations, not able to vote even, with a crushing debt load?
From what I’ve learned of Berwick and other Obama appointees like Cass Sunstein, John Holdren, Carol Browner et al., they seem like robots whose brains have been programmed with robotically “correct” thinking.
The honchos at the EU, much the same & anything and anyone associated with the UN.
These people all seem to be in the grips of some monstrous mental disorder.
While this crowd diddles around and “studies” the awful activities of the contemptible US, the vicious and lousy actors throughout the world are having a field day.
In lieu of all these Leftist “fashionable” attacks on the US, I suggest that Julian at wikileaks drop a few along lines of Taliban atrocities and mass murders in Afghanistan (not to mention Pakistan), Putin’s secret operations to disappear his detractors, Nork proliferation & where they dump their money while the population starves, the Chicoms, even just some straightforward stuff on Mugabe and al-Bashir.
However, Julian might be disappeared down an elevator shaft if he did that, not to mention falling out of favor with all the cute-sy élites of the world, probably a fate worse than death for him.
I’m ashamed to say this so-called doctor who justifies his inhumane thinking is connected to my hospital, MGH. What a man for an adviser!
John Rosenthal takes exception to Obama’s appointment of a medical doctor to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services…..
“President Obama’s recess appointment of Donald Berwick to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has sparked controversy for, among other reasons, Berwick’s connections to the Massachusetts-based advocacy group Physicians for Human Rights (PHR).”
A medical doctor who is a Physicians for Human Rights Board member is being opposed because PHR opposes American torture and Israeli harsh tactics? This is America. We’re supposed to be above torture. PHR investigates instances of Israeli torture and that is a bad thing? Read the transcript…..
physiciansforhumanrights.org/library/…/report-useofforce-israel.pdf
Whatever could be wrong with investigating? Actually, in one case, The PHR actually exonerates Israel. In the case of a Palestinian man named Issam Judeh Mustafa Hamed, who was allegedly tortured and killed, The PHR backed up the claim that Israeli authorities gave for his death. He died in a vehicular roll-over accident.
I fail to understand why being connected to a group that performs unbiased investigations of abuse would detract from his ability to head an agency involved in health care issues? After all, he is a medical doctor.
a group that performs unbiased investigations of abuse
It probably shouldn’t.
Let us know when that candidate is proposed.
One wonders, is it just the affiliations of lefty politicians that don’t matter, or are you going to graciously extend that immunity to politicians of a more conservative bent?
I don’t quite get what you’re getting at. “…is it just the affiliations of lefty politicians that don’t matter, or are you going to graciously extend that immunity to politicians of a more conservative bent?”
This position is for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. A medical doctor was picked. I know nothing of his affiliation (-yes, he is probably a dem), but i wouldn’t want a conservative from a defense oriented think tank to head that department. That said, Obama’s Defense Secretary isn’t what I’d call a liberal. I’d expect that department head to be a man acquainted with the pentagon, no matter what his political stripe. I hope I didn’t disappoint you.
Gee, you mean you completely missed the point of the article? That Dr. Berwick is a member of the Board of Directors of a controversial group?
No, you can’t be that dumb. Therefore you think I am. Allow me to point out that I am not.
Now that we’ve established that, will you answer my question with respect to double standards?
If you mistook me to infer you’re dumb, I apologize. I just wanted to point out Dr. Berwick appears to be a suitable candidate for the job, just as Robert Gates could be considered suitable for Secretary of Defense. Too much is made of a person’s perceived party affiliation by both ends of the political spectrum.
Dr. Berwick may be considered controversial because of his affiliation with Physicians for Human Rights. I know little about the group so I looked up Physicians for Human Rights, and I find it could be argued that they in fact can do a fair assessment of investigating. See my post at the top of thread #7.
Once again, you evade the question. I’ll give you a third chance.
Will you give the same consideration to a conservative on the board of directors of an organization that lefties find controversial, or is this just another lefty double standard?
Answer that question, if you dare. One more spin, and I’ll assume the answer is “lefty double standard.”
Donny Berwick is just another self-hating Jew, anti-Israel Jew. They are cheap and work cheap. A 2004 Boston Globe Mag interview goes into Berwick’s religion
ConservativeWanderer, asks:
“Will you give the same consideration to a conservative on the board of directors of an organization that lefties find controversial, or is this just another lefty double standard?”
-Sure, if that individual is qualified, and NOT trying to gut Medicare and Medicaid Services since some conservatives advocate the end of these two programs. Satisfied?
When I said:
“-Sure, if that individual is qualified, and NOT trying to gut Medicare and Medicaid Services since some conservatives advocate the end of these two programs.”
The same standard would apply if a military hating progressive were chosen to be Secretary of Defense. We’d be ill served by having someone heading The Pentagon who’d not understand the threats our military is preparing for.
This was what I was trying to say. Sorry for the mixup, I wasn’t trying to avoid your question.