CAT/C/41/D/291/2006 page 9 cases in which the Committee considered that such abuse constituted acts of torture.14 The complainant was also subjected to objectively credible threats that she and members of her family would be raped and to insults and obscenities that caused mental suffering which itself amounted to a form of torture.15 The circumstances and unfolding of events, as well as the insults, leave no doubt that the intention was to trigger feelings of humiliation and inferiority.16 The complainant was stripped by force by a person of the opposite sex in the presence of many other persons of the opposite sex. Tearing off her clothes could not be justified by security concerns: it was intended specifically to humiliate her. It also indicates a departure from the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, article 8 (a) of which requires institutions that receive both men and women to keep the whole of the premises allocated to women entirely separate. 3.9 According to the complainant, it is clear that this abuse was inflicted by public officials, as required by article 1 of the Convention, as it was committed by civil servants and members of the forces of law and order acting in that capacity. Moreover, this physical abuse was intentionally inflicted with the aim of punishing her for her remarks to an official. The various officials before whom the complainant was brought questioned her solely about those remarks, and the judge sentenced her on the basis of those remarks. 3.10 According to the complainant, the State party also failed in its obligation to take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture. For over 10 years, international human rights treaty-monitoring bodies have been expressing concern about the widespread use of torture and have made recommendations to get the State party to 14 Counsel refers to communication No. 207/2002, Dragan Dimitrijevic v. Serbia and Montenegro, cit. (a young detainee not charged with any offence beaten repeatedly by police officers in a police station), and communication No. 49/1996, S.V. et al. v. Canada, Views adopted on 15 May 2001 (complainant brutally assaulted by soldiers and beaten about the head until he lost consciousness). 15 Counsel refers to the report of the Special Rapporteur on the question of torture contained in document A/56/156: “It is the Special Rapporteur’s opinion that serious and credible threats, including death threats, to the physical integrity of the victim or a third person can amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or even to torture, especially when the victim remains in the hands of law enforcement officials” (para. 8). 16 Counsel refers to the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, which has considered that, in order to establish whether treatment is degrading, it is necessary to determine whether its object is to humiliate and debase the person concerned and whether, as far as the consequences are concerned, it adversely affected his or her personality in a manner incompatible with article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The Court concluded that obliging a person to strip naked in the presence of a person of the opposite sex shows a clear lack of respect for the individual concerned, who is subjected to a genuine assault on his or her dignity (see Valašinas v. Lithuania, application No. 44558/98, ECHR 2001-VIII, and Iwańczuk v. Poland, application No. 25196/94, 15 November 2001).