Human Rights

The convention against Torture has not brought an end to states horrific abuse of their citizens. Far from it. Although the convention has not achieved its lofty goals, it has contributed to the almost universal view that torture is an unacceptable practice.
The aim of this essay is to critically analyse how the Committee against Torture and the Human Right Committee have both generated a rich jurisprudence on the extent of state obligations related to the prohibition of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment beyond the traditional view of or preventing the use of torture in interrogations.

Torture has received so many international recognition due to its wide use in the Second World War. Torture is clarly defined in section 1 (1) of the Convention against Torture as ‘…any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession’. Other explanation of torture is that it ‘…is intended to humiliate, offend and degrade a human being and turn him or her into a thing’.1

There is a wide record of the use of torture since the history of mankind. For example, in the Roman law, it was customary to apply torture as a way of uncovering the commission of a crime.2 Also, there were reports of torture being permitted in situations where a confession was needed for a punishment in Japanese and Chinese criminal code.3. Also, the United Nations in its Special Rapporteur on torture in 1987 to the United Nations Human Rights Commission, indicated that torture is a common occurrence in all states.4 However, torture was given a positive view by the Isreali Supreme Court Judge Landau who decided that it was legal to apply torture on Palestinian prisoners to protect Isreali citizens and also fight terrorism. This view was condemned by professor Leibovitz who held that any form of torture should be opposed by all