We cannot say that torture has decreased,” reveals UN Committee against Torture on key anniversary

GENEVA (10 December 2009) -- Twenty-five years after the adoption of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment*, the UN Committee against Torture sends a warning signal about “a worrisome and grim reality,” in which the Convention’s provisions and the Committee’s recommendations are often not implemented by States parties.

 

Despite an impressive international legal framework, “we cannot say that torture has decreased,” warned Thursday the Committee’s Chairperson, Claudio Grossman, on the 25th anniversary of the adoption of the Convention.

 

The purpose of the Convention is to make more effective the struggle against torture and other ill-treatment throughout the world, and up to now “146 States have ratified or acceded to the Convention out of the 192 Members States of the United Nations,” explained Mr. Grossman; however, “full implementation is far from being achieved.”

 

On 10 December 1984, the UN General Assembly called upon all governments to consider ratifying the Convention as a matter of priority, as the right to be free from torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment derives from the inherent dignity of the human person.

 

Among the main obstacles, the Committee’s Chairperson noted the refusal to adopt a clear definition of torture, to criminalize torture and establish adequate penalties; as well as the failure to investigate alleged torture and the impunity for perpetrators of acts of torture.

 

Grossman drew attention also the expulsion, return and extradition of persons to States where there are substantial grounds for believing that they are in danger of being tortured, and “rendition” of suspects to countries that continue to use torture as a means of investigation and interrogation.

 

“Deplorable conditions of detention are still the norm in too many States,” he stressed the representative of the UN Committee against Torture. “Forced disappearances continue to deny persons their basic legal safeguards, and rehabilitation or compensation is rarely provided to victims of torture or their families.”

 

The adoption of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, 25 years ago, “was an important act to imagine and help shape the world in which we want to live – one which, unfortunately, still remains unrealized,” said Grossman.

 

“I call upon all Members States of the United Nations to ratify or accede to the Convention, and upon all States parties to the Convention to fully implement the Convention’s provisions and the Committee’s recommendations, to withdraw their reservations to the Convention, and to report to the Committee on the measures they have undertaken to prevent torture and ill-treatment,” the Committee’s Chairperson

 

“Only then will we move closer to achieving the better world imagined 25 years ago.”

 

(*) Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment: http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/cat.htm

 

Learn more about the Committee against Torture: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CAT/Pages/CATIndex.aspx