United Nations Human Rights Website - Treaty Bodies Database - Document - Sessional/Annual Report of Committee - of the Convention. In this connection, the Committee decided to continue its practice of making available lists of States parties whose reports are overdue during the press conferences that the Committee usually hold at the end of each session. 22. The Committee again requested the Secretary-General to continue sending reminders automatically to those States parties whose initial reports were more than 12 months overdue and subsequent reminders every six months. The status of submission of reports by States parties under article 19 of the Convention as at 9 May 1997, the closing date of the eighteenth session of the Committee, is given in annex III. V. CONSIDERATION OF REPORTS SUBMITTED BY STATES PARTIES UNDER ARTICLE 19 OF THE CONVENTION 23. At its seventeenth and eighteenth sessions, the Committee considered reports submitted by 13 States parties, under article 19, paragraph 1, of the Convention. At its seventeenth session, the Committee devoted 13 of the 19 meetings held to the consideration of reports (see CAT/C/SR.264-268 and 272279). The following reports, listed in the order in which they were received by the Secretary-General, were before the Committee at its seventeenth session: Russian Federation (second periodic report) CAT/C/17/Add.15 Republic of Korea (initial report) CAT/C/32/Add.1 Algeria (second periodic report) CAT/C/25/Add.8 Uruguay (second periodic report) CAT/C/17/Add.16 Poland (second periodic report) CAT/C/25/Add.9 Georgia (initial report) CAT/C/28/Add.1 24. The Committee was informed by the media during the session that the Supreme Court of Israel had declared lawful the use of physical pressure by the Israeli security services in interrogating specific suspects of terrorist acts with a view to obtaining from them information which would prevent the perpetration of criminal acts in the future. The Committee took the view that, if the information was correct, the decision taken by the Supreme Court of Israel was incompatible with the provisions of the Convention. 25. In a letter that the Chairman of the Committee addressed on the Committee's behalf to the Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations Office at Geneva on 22 November 1996, it was recalled that article 2, paragraph 2, of the Convention provides that no exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture. Reference was also made to article 19, paragraph 1, of the Convention, which stipulates that the States parties shall submit supplementary reports every four years on any new measures taken and such other reports as the Committee may request. Accordingly, the Committee invited the Government of Israel to submit as a matter of urgency a special report on the question of the decision taken by the Supreme Court and its implication for the implementation of the Convention in Israel. The Committee indicated 31 January 1997 as the time limit for the submission of the report. The Government of Israel submitted the special report on 6 December 1996 and revised it on http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/(Symbol)/de75e94f920bd0a0802565a600537744?Opendocument (10 of 109)16/10/2006 9:54:12 AM