Scientists Claim CIA Misused Work on Sleep Deprivation

also: Sex, Death and the Gods - video (Indian girls sold for sex at puberty)

"the maximum allowable period of sleep deprivation allowed under the CIA interrogation program was 264 hours, though no detainee was deprived of sleep for more than 180 hours, or 7½ days....he detainees were kept awake by being forced to stand, sit or recline in uncomfortable positions, with shackled limbs. At the same time, detainees could undergo stressful treatments, including significant dietary restrictions and violence, like waterboarding and walling."

Scientists Claim CIA Misused Work on Sleep Deprivation
By Michael Scherer Washington Apr. 21, 2009 German and French researchers whose work has been cited by the CIA and the Justice Department to help justify the legality of harsh interrogation techniques, including prolonged sleep deprivation, condemned the Bush Administration on Tuesday for misusing their scientific findings.

"It is total nonsense to cite our study in this context," said Dr. Bernd Kundermann, a professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at the University of Marburg.
"I'm disappointed, upset, consternated and even hurt at seeing this," said Dr. S. Hakki Onen, a sleep specialist and geriatrician with the Hôpital Gériatrique A. Charial, part of the Hospices Civils de Lyon in France. "To see [the research] used in this manner is upsetting because [the CIA's] goals run counter to the therapeutic intent of our effort ... In publishing clinical findings like this, you're aware you lose control of them, because they can be read and even abused by people who may have other objectives in mind."

Kundermann and Onen are the second and third European sleep scientists to speak out this week against the CIA's use of published academic literature on sleep deprivation. On Monday, James Horne, a British researcher who was also cited by CIA medical experts in recently declassified memos, called the agency's medical reasoning "nonsense."....

According to the Justice Department memos, the maximum allowable period of sleep deprivation allowed under the CIA interrogation program was 264 hours, though no detainee was deprived of sleep for more than 180 hours, or 7½ days. Only three detainees had been subjected to sleep deprivation for more than 96 hours. The detainees were kept awake by being forced to stand, sit or recline in uncomfortable positions, with shackled limbs. At the same time, detainees could undergo stressful treatments, including significant dietary restrictions and violence, like waterboarding and walling.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1892897,00.html

Sex, Death and the Gods - video
Interview with filmmaker Beeban Kidron, plus exclusive clips from her new film. Sex, Death and the Gods explores the complex world of India's devadasi, girls devoted to a goddess and then sold for sex at puberty

Beeban Kidron's film about the devadasi, Storyville: Sex, Death and the Gods, will be shown on BBC4 on Monday 24 January at 10pm
Lindsay Poulton and Joanna Moorhead
guardian.co.uk Friday 21 January 2011
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/video/2011/jan/21/sex-death-gods-video