38 Tainted by Torture: Examining the Use of Torture Evidence | 2018 ‘[T]o-date, no conviction has been quashed, dismissed or revised on the grounds that it has been delivered based on forced confessions under torture. There are probably dozens, if not hundreds of prisoners serving out their sentence delivered before the revolution based on forced confessions’.192 iii) Vietnam has not recognised the competence of the UN Committee Against Torture to carry out confidential inquiries, and in 2015 refused to allow the Committee to undertake an inquiry.193 However, a number of NGOs have reported on the routine use of torture in places of detention and the failure of the legal regime to exclude reliance on ‘torture evidence’.194 In two of the countries examined (Mexico and Kenya), new anti-torture legislation with clear exclusionary regimes has been enacted, at least in part, in response to concerns about the torture of suspects. With respect to Mexico, for example, the UN Committee Against Torture reported in 2012: ‘[w]hile taking note of constitutional guarantees relating to the inadmissibility of evidence obtained in a manner that violates fundamental rights, the Committee regrets that some courts continue to accept confessions that have apparently been obtained under duress or through torture’.195 It is too early to tell what impact Mexico’s anti-torture legislation will have. However, it is disappointing that official data is not being collected to measure this and we are not aware of any data collection by civil society. There are also reports that, in practice, confessions resulting from torture are being used routinely in countries with express and absolute exclusionary regimes which, on paper at least, comply with international standards. For example, a 2015 report by Amnesty International found that, despite a range of new regulations and procedural rules implemented in China, security officials in some areas ‘still relied overwhelmingly on extracting confessions through torture to ‘break’ cases’.196 IV.2 Justice sector professionals High-tech medical equipment is of little use if no one has been told that the hospital has acquired it or if there are no trained doctors and nurses to operate it. The same applies with legal protections like the exclusionary rule. New legislation can be a relatively cheap and easy way for countries to respond to demands for action to address human rights abuses, whether from local voters, civil society or international bodies. However, all too often, this legislation fails because justice professionals aren’t aware of it; are otherwise unwilling or unable to apply the law; or, indeed, because there are insufficient defence lawyers to argue for the legislation to be applied in individual cases. In Tunisia, legislation was introduced in 2011 to prevent reliance on confessions obtained by torture,197 but since the new provision was introduced, no judge has explicitly made use of the provision to exclude evidence obtained by torture. In his country visit to Tunisia, the former UN Special Rapporteur on torture, Juan Mendez, noted that ‘in practice, confessions obtained under torture are not expressly excluded as evidence in court’.198 He also expressed concern at the lack of instruction to the courts with regard to implementing the exclusionary rule as well as ordering an immediate, impartial and effective investigation where evidence may have been obtained by torture.199 If legislation is not resulting in changes to practice, it is important to try to understand the barriers to effective implementation. However, this can be challenging and requires in-depth qualitative engagement with often hard-to-reach state actors such as judges, prosecutors and lawyers.200 This is beyond the scope of the current report and we are unaware of any qualitative research being undertaken, such as through qualitative interviews of lawyers, prosecutors and judges. However, the following factors are likely to be relevant in this context. IV.2.1. Training One key question is whether judges, prosecutors, police and lawyers have received training on the relevant domestic laws and international standards. The need for appropriate training is frequently recommended by human rights monitoring bodies. In 2008, for example, having commented on the routine use of torture to extract confessions in Indonesia, the Special Rapporteur on Torture