In the Soviet Union psychiatrists administer drugs as a form of punishment to prisoners of conscience detained in psychiatric hospitals. The drugs may serve to compel the prisoner to renounce his or her religious or political beliefs, or they may be given as "treatment" for a prisoner's continuing "delusions". In the summer of 1980, for example, Vladimir Tsurikov, a 35-year-old worker from Krasnoyarsk, was interned for the third time in the USSR in connection with his peaceful attempts to emigrate. He describes the effect of drugs forcibly given to him:

"The triftazin [stelazine] made me writhe, and my legs began to twist about in a ridiculous way. I lost the ability to walk, while simultaneously feeling very restive and also feeling sharp pains in my buttocks at any movement-a result of the sulfazin (a one per . cent solution of elemental sulphur in oil). Fainting fits began, recurring very often: I fell and hit my head on the floor and on the brick walls. The pain prevented me sleeping or eating. The sulfazin made my temperature rise, and it then stayed around 40 degrees centigrade. Sometimes I experienced slight shivering and my tongue hung out... This nightmare lasted a week, until I was invited to chat with some medical students. I couldn't walk, so I was carried. In the auditorium it turned out that I couldn't move my tongue. I was taken back and they began to give me anti-parkinsonian drugs, which made me feel a bit better. I was still suffering from the sulfazin, and I had got much thinner, but at the next meeting with the students I was able to talk with them."

Like at least nine other known dissenters who were forcibly confined to psychiatric hospitals shortly before foreign visitors arrived in Moscow to attend the Olympic Games in July 1980, Vladimir Tsurikov was released shortly after the Games ended.

Different security agencies develop their own methods and procedures for interrogating prisoners under torture. The Venezuelan born film director Nelson Arrieti described his interrogation in El Salvador after being abducted by security forces in January 1981 from a hotel lobby in the capital, San Salvador:

"There were three different levels,
you might say, three types of inter-
rogation and three types of inter-
rogator. The first was the most
brutal, with a great deal of beating.
There was a lot of violence. They
threatened to kill me, and shouted
at me to tell them everything I
knew about the revolution and the
guerrilla movement. This is the
typical brutal policy which pro-
duces a basic fear in the prisoner
and which is intended to demoralize
him.

"The second type is on a higher
level. This is carried out by a
policeman whose language is less
crude, who asks general questions,
without beatings, using a more
refined language.

"The third type is the trained
policeman who does not administer
beatings or make threats, but who
tries to explain the problem and
who converses with a certain degree
of ideological understanding. He
is the type of man who tries to be
friendly and make promises. He
allows the prisoner to relax
emotionally. His intellectual
resources and investigative
methods are better. I recall that it
was these policemen who offered
me a light sentence and offered to
help me if I signed a telex for the
international press, declaring that
the Junta had played a beneficial
role and that agrarian reform had
been a success and that the revol-
utionary movement had failed.
They make you fear for your life.
"Your life is in our hands'
that is the situation in a nutshell.
'If you say nothing, it makes no
difference, you are still condemned
because we know everything."

Many others remain in prison, their situation uncertain and vulnerable. Inter

Torture and ill-treatment are often inflicted as judicial punishments, sometimes in addition to prison sentences. In Pakistan since the imposition of martial law in 1977 sentences of flogging can be imposed under both martial law regulations and Islamic law. Many floggings are conducted in public.

Baljit Singh, blinded by the police in Bihar, India, in 1980. Thirty-six suspected criminals suffered the same fate. One of the men said that officers held him down, punctured his eyes with bicycle spokes and then wrapped acid-soaked pads over his eyes.

national support for them remains vital. After an Amnesty International mission to Morocco in 1981, where delegates visited Kenitra Central Prison, Amnesty International received this message from a prisoner currently held there who had previously been tortured and had campaigned together with other prisoners of conscience for improved conditions:

"It is incontestable that our situ-
ation has improved in prison, but
our situation is very precarious,
since it is based on no judicial text
(the government does not recog-
nize having political detainees,
and we are officially considered
common criminals). In other
words, the 'privileges' we have
obtained thanks to the struggles
we have waged in prison and the
support given to us at the interna-
tional level by many organizations,
above all Amnesty International,
all these 'privileges' are constantly
threatened."

As well as caning and flogging, in a few countries amputations can be inflicted as courtordered punishments: three convicted thieves. each of whom had a hand amputated in Mauritania in September 1980.

The Human Rights Committee, in an authoritative "General Comment" adopted on 27 July 1982, pointed out that it is not sufficient for the implementation of Article 7 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the prohibition of torture and of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, for states to make such practices a crime. Since the practices occur despite existing penal provisions, states should take additional preventive and remedial steps to ensure effective control. At the very least, in the Committee's view, these measures should include the following:

"Complaints about ill-treatment
must be investigated effectively by
competent authorities. Those

found guilty must be held respon-
sible, and the alleged victims must
themselves have effective remedies
at their disposal, including the
right to obtain compensation.
Among the safeguards which may
make control effective are pro-
visions against detention incom-
municado, granting, without pre-
judice to the investigation, persons
such as doctors, lawyers and family
members access to the detainees;
provisions requiring that detain-
ees should be held in places that
are publicly recognized and that
their names and places of detention
should be entered in a central
register available to persons con-
cerned, such as relatives; provisions
making confessions or other evi-
dence obtained through torture or
other treatment contrary to Article
7 inadmissible in court; enforce-
ment officials not to apply such
treatment."

Any universally applicable set of measures to stop torture must include those listed by the Human Rights Committee. Based on its own experience, Amnesty International has elaborated a more comprehensive body of safeguards and remedies against torture. The following measures derive from evidence provided by personal testimonies of torture, the work of domestic groups and international organizations combating torture and the lessons learned from the experience of particular countries in curtailing torture.

1. Official directives condemning torture

The head of state, head of government and heads of different security forces

should state unequivocally that they will not tolerate, under any circumstances, the ill-treatment of detainees by officials at all levels under their responsibility. Such clear orders from the top, when disseminated to all agents, would be a forceful signal that detainees' rights and the law itself must be respected.

2. Restriction of incommunicado detention

Almost invariably the victims of torture are held incommunicado, both for purposes of interrogation and to allow any marks of torture to disappear. Ensuring prompt and regular access to one's own lawyer, doctor and family and to a court of law would diminish the likelihood of ill-treatment, especially during the first hours and days of detention when, in Amnesty International's experience, illtreatment is most likely. All prisoners should be brought promptly before a judicial authority to assess the legality and necessity of the detention as well as the treatment of the detainee.

The following questions provide an indication of a government's willingness to provide safeguards against the abuse of incommunicado detention. Does the government allow the courts the independence to enforce writs of habeas corpus, amparo or similar remedy whenever a detainee is not brought quickly before a court of law? Does the government require that the detaining authorities allow prompt and regular access to the detainee by his or her lawyer as well as prompt and reasonable access by members of the family? Can an independent physician chosen by the family gain access to the detainee upon reasonable request, even if the detainee has not made such a request?

Regular communication and consultation with a lawyer are of the utmost importance to ensure, among other legal guarantees, that statements taken in evidence from the detainee are given freely and not as a result of coercion. Such consultations must occur at a minimum before and between interrogation sessions and in a degree of privacy if the lawyer's presence is to serve as a credible restraint on the interrogators' potential abuse of power.

3. Record-keeping by the detaining authority

In some countries torture takes place in secret centres. Governments should ensure that prisoners are held in publicly recognized places and that accurate infor

mation about their whereabouts is made available to relatives and lawyers.

There should be no doubt where and in whose care a prisoner is at a given time. An accurate central register of detainees in each district, in the form of a bound book with numbered pages, with a record of their time of arrest and places of initial and subsequent detention would prevent secret detention and the "disappearance" of people in custody.

It would also give families and lawyers the possibility of locating the detainee. Each detention centre should be required to keep a detailed contemporary record, again bound with numbered pages, of the time of arrest, identities of the authorities who performed the arrest, time of appearance before a judicial authority, times and durations of each interrogation session, times when statements were given, and a complete record of who was present at all of the above instances. All officers present at the taking of a written statement could be required to countersign the statement.

Such records could be supplemented by a personal data sheet giving information about the times of medical examinations, who conducted them, times and place. of interrogation, identities of interrogators by name or number, a record of meals and of requests or complaints made by detainees or on their behalf. This data sheet would accompany the detainee when transferred, and the officer in charge of the detainee would sign the data sheet.

Legitimate force used against a detainee or violence by the detainee against guards, interrogators or his or her self could be recorded on this data sheet. Evidence of injuries sustained in custody in the absence of any such record would be an indication that these injuries were more likely to be the result of illegal violence used by officials than of any abovementioned (but unrecorded) causes.

All records would be available to the detainee and his or her legal adviser.

4. Safeguards during Interrogation and custody Strict procedures are needed to regulate the process of interrogation itself. A clear chain of command within the agency would indicate who is responsible for supervising interrogation procedures and practices and for disciplining officers who violate these procedures. The procedures could include such matters as the regular and personal supervision of interrogation by senior officers, as well as specified limitations on the duration of interrogation sessions and the number of interrogators.

Particular precautions should be taken to avoid the abuse during interrogation of women and juvenile detainees. Procedures should stipulate that a female officer be present during all interrogation of women detainees and that the questioning of juveniles take place in the presence of a parent or guardian. It would be a further commitment to preventing torture if the government published the interrogation procedures cur

rently in force and periodically reviewed both procedures and practices, inviting submissions and recommendations from civil rights groups, defence lawyers, bar associations and other interested parties.

5. Notification to detainees of their rights

At the moment of detention or arrest, or promptly thereafter, detainees should be entitled to know why they have been detained or arrested, where held and by which agency. They should also receive an explanation, orally and in writing, in a language that they understand, of how to avail themselves of their legal rights, including the right to lodge complaints of ill-treatment.

6. Regular system of visits to places of detention

Detention centres should be visited regularly and routinely by individuals independent of the detaining authorities. These individuals may be appointed by independent national bodies, or they may be delegates from international bodies such as the International Committee of the Red Cross. They should be able to communicate with detainees without prison staff being present.

7. Separation of authority over detention and interrogation Detainees subjected to torture are often held in custody and interrogated by the same agency. The formal separation of these two security functions would allow some protection for detainees by providing a degree of supervision of their welfare by an agency not engaged in interrogating them.

8. Training in human rights norms for all security agents All personnel involved in law enforcement duties-military, police and prison staff-should receive proper education and training concerning the prohibitions against torture given in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other instruments including the UN Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials, the UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners and the UN Declaration against Torture. Domestic laws and regulations against torture should be included. These texts should be translated as necessary and disseminated to all central and local authorities involved in the process of arrest, interrogation, detention or the administration of justice. An absolute prohibition of torture and ill-treatment as crimes under domestic law should be visibly displayed in every detention centre in the country. Law enforcement officials should be instructed that they are obliged to refuse to obey any order to torture.

9. Domestic legislation The UN Declaration against Torture calls on each state to ensure that torture is an offence under its criminal law (Article 7). The criminal code should treat torture as a crime and establish appropriate penalties for those found guilty. Incitement to torture or complicity

in torture should likewise constitute criminal offences. In recognition of the fact that the crime of torture is forbidden by international law, domestic legislation should stipulate that the crime of torture is not subject to any statute of limitations. It should oblige the government to seek the extradition of its own officials accused of torture if they flee to another country to avoid prosecution, and to prosecute or extradite foreign officials accused of torture elsewhere but now residing within its jurisdiction. In some legal systems a law could also allow individuals to initiate criminal proceedings against officials accused of torture if public authorities did not do so, and to have the right to participate fuily in the proceedings.

10. Repeal of provisions of emergency legislation that diminish detainees' rights Provisions of emergency legislation or excessive decrees that weaken safeguards against the abuse of authority-for example, by allowing unchecked periods of incommunicado detention or suspending the right of habeas corpus or its equivalent-may facilitate torture. The promulgation and continued enforcement of such legal provisions is often taken as a signal by the security forces that neither the government nor the courts will interfere with their methods. The repeal of such measures would be an objective signal to the contrary.

11. Medical safeguards

The presence and formal independence of a fully qualified doctor at all detention centres can provide protection from illtreatment. In practice, the government must recognize the principles that it is a serious breach of medical ethics for health personnel to be involved in torture and that the medical officers on duty are responsible for the health of detainees and must have the clinical independence to perform this duty. One indication of independence would be if medical officers were responsible to an authority other than the security forces or prison administration. Further procedures of the medical examinations of all detainees could include the following:

a. the offer of an examination on arrival at a detention centre, before interrogation begins;

b. the offer of an examination every subsequent 24 hours while under interrogation and immediately prior to transfer or release;

c. these offers should be made personally by the medical officer on duty, who would explain the importance of having complete records of the detainee's condition in detention;

d. detainees should be informed in the written notice of their rights about the importance of these examinations;

e. all examinations should be conducted in private by medical personnel only;

TORTURE BRIEFING

f. any refusal by a detainee to have any of these examinations should be witnessed in writing by the medical officer;

g. daily visits to each detainee by a medical officer, and access by the detainee to the medical officer on duty at any time on reasonable request;

h. detailed record-keeping by medical personnel of such matters as the weight of the detainee, marks on the body, psychological state and complaints related to health or treatment;

i. these records should be treated as confidential, as in any doctorpatient relationship, but capable of being communicated at the detainee's request to his or her lawyer or family;

j. examination by the detainee's own doctor at the request of the detainee or of his or her lawyer or family, not in the presence of prison guards. Governments should make obligatory post-mortem examinations of all individuals who die in custody or shortly after release, from whatever cause. Such postmortem examinations would need to be conducted by an independent forensic pathologist, with access granted by law to the examination, evidence and any subsequent hearings to a representative of the family, their lawyer and doctor.

12. No use of statements extracted under torture Governments should ensure that confessions or other evidence obtained through torture may never be invoked in legal proceedings. Prosecuting authorities should be instructed not to submit in evidence confessions or other information which may have been obtained as a result of torture or oppression of the defendant or any other person. Judges should be required to exclude all such evidence.

13. Investigation of complaints and reports of torture

As stated in the UN Declaration against Torture, governments should ensure that all complaints and well-founded reports of torture are impartially investigated. Complainants and witnesses should be protected from intimidation.

Even if some form of official complaints machinery does exist, there may be a reluctance to use it. Victims of torture may fear reprisals from the security forces. Sometimes, ill-treatment is not reported because the victims do not believe that it will do any good. They may believe that the word of a security official will be given more weight in court than their own testimony. They may wish to protect their families from the fear and anxiety caused by the knowledge that they were tortured. In some societies it is thought undignified to admit to having been tortured. In others, it may be particularly difficult for victims, especially women, to reveal that they have been physically or sexually abused. Just as the

TORTURE BRIEFING

existence of allegations cannot be taken as proof of torture, the paucity of official complaints does not demonstrate its absence. Therefore, complaints procedures should provide for an investigation of allegations wherever there is reasonable ground to believe that torture has occurred, even if formal complaints have not been lodged.

Based on its experience, Amnesty International believes that complaints procedures should reflect the following principles.

1. The main objective of complaints machinery is to establish, to the degree of certainty possible, whether torture or ill-treatment has occurred. As it is not a criminal inquiry, it should therefore not be necessary to prove beyond reasonable doubt who committed the offence in order to conclude that an offence has taken place.

2. The investigating body, however constituted, should be able to demonstrate its formal independence from the detaining and interrogating authorities as well as from governmental pressure and influence. In order that its findings prove credible, the government might include among its members persons nominated by independent non-governmental bodies such as the country's bar and medical associations. There is no strong reason to exclude representatives of the general public, especially in countries with systems involving trials by jury, from serving on a board charged with reviewing complaints against the police.

3. The terms of reference of the investigating body should include the authority to subpoena witnesses, records and documents, to take testimony under oath, and to invite evidence and submissions from interested individuals and non-governmental organizations. The investigating body should also have powers to review procedures and practices related to the notification of arrest; to visits to detainees by lawyers, family and their own physicians; to medical examinations and treatment and to the admissibility of statements in court allegedly obtained by coercion.

4. The investigating body should be capable of acting on its own initiative, without having to receive formal complaints, whenever there is good reason to believe that torture has occurred. To do so, it must be given the staff and other resources to carry out autonomous investigations.

5. The methods and findings should be public.

6. The investigation should be speedy if it is to serve the cause of either justice or deterrence.

7. The right to file a complaint should be available to all current and former detainees, their lawyers, families and to any other person or organization acting on their behalf.

8. Accurate records of complaints filed should be published on a regular basis.

9. Security agents against whom repeated complaints of ill-treatment are filed should be transferred, without prejudice, to duties not directly related to arresting, guarding or interrogating detainees, pending a thorough review by senior officers of their conduct.

10. The investigating body should have available to it the medical documentation resulting from an examination by an independent doctor given immediately after the complaint is filed. Records of any post-mortem examination relevant to a complaint should likewise by available.

14. Prosecution of alleged torturers

The complaints procedures described above are not a substitute for the proper functioning of the courts.

The jurisdiction of the courts should extend to the investigation of complaints of torture against any member of the security forces and to the prosecution of any security agent accused of torture. The subjects of judicial investigation and prosecution should include not only those who participate in torture but also all those who incite it, attempt it, consciously cover it up, or are otherwise directly implicated in its use. Commanding officers should be held accountable for torture committed by officials under

their command. The principle responsibility to instigate criminal prosecutions lies with the state authorities and should be exercised once there is reason to believe that specific agents can be convicted of torture or ill-treatment. 15. Disciplinary measures Disciplinary procedures within the security forces or relevant professional bodies (e.g. the medical authority that licenses doctors to practise) should be pursued promptly and without prejudice to any form of court action.

16. Civil remedies

A complainant or person acting on his or her behalf should be able to seek damages in civil proceedings against individual security agents, the agency, its commanding officer and the state itself. The fact that a previous criminal prosecution on the same charges has not resulted in the conviction of specific agents should not preclude civil actions to obtain damages.

17. Compensation and rehabilitation

Assistance to torture victims by the state should include medical rehabilitation as needed and financial compensation commensurate with the abuse inflicted and damages suffered. His or her assistance should follow from a finding that torture or ill-treatment has occurred and should be awarded to the detainee without prejudice to any other criminal or civil proceedings. In the event of a detainee's death being shown to be the result of torture or ill-treatment, the deceased's family should receive compensatory and exemplary damages against the state without prejudice to any other criminal or civil proceedings.

18. Ratification of international instruments

As a further sign of a government's will to prevent torture all states should ratify the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and its Optional Protocol providing for individual complaints.

A further sign would be the declaration by the government that it will cooperate with international inquiries into allegations of torture by appropriate intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations.