57
avenues for accountability including judicial and
administrative sanctions against those responsible.326
Optional Protocol to the Convention, as well as
other treaties.
Satisfaction has been frequently ordered in human
rights jurisprudence to address injuries which involve
breaches of trust, in which acknowledgement and
commemoration may help to contribute to an
effective remedy.327 Criminal investigations have also
been ordered as satisfaction. Cessation, as a form of
satisfaction, has been emphasised as a remedy for
continuing violations. For example, in cases of
disappearance, full disclosure of the truth, and the
need to locate and identify remains, is understood to
be central.328
States are regularly being asked to take active steps to
prevent torture and other prohibited ill-treatment,
which usually requires them to take a range of
legislative, educative and practical measures to outlaw
the practice, including ending impunity. Guarantees
of non repetition include: strengthening monitoring
mechanisms and other procedural safeguards
applicable to detainees and others who come into
contact with authorities; strengthening policies and
legislation; vetting public officials; and setting up
commissions of inquiry to investigate wide-scale
occurrences of torture.
VII.2.5 Guarantees of non-repetition
Reducing the reliance on confession-based evidence
and other, similar recommendations that have been
made by the Special Rapporteur on Torture329 are
important ways in which states can reduce the
incentive to coerce statements from detainees. This,
in turn, will help to reduce the practice of torture.
The prevention of torture is a clear component of the
overall prohibition on torture and an important part
of the UN Convention Against Torture and the
300
Arzate case, Mexican Supreme Court of Justice, Amparo Review No. 703/2012.
301
Judgment of the Spanish Supreme Court No. 737/2009 (Criminal Division) of 6 July 2009, legal basis number four, para 29.
302
For example, Judgment of the Spanish Constitutional Court No. 7/2004 of 9 February 2004. The Spanish Constitutional Court considered that the declarations made before
the investigating judge were flawed by the torture previously suffered by the accused. Consequently, the evidence was excluded. However, the accused were ultimately
convicted on the basis of other evidence that was independent from the declarations obtained by torture. See similarly, Mexican Supreme Court of Justice, Direct Amparo
Review, No. 6564/2015.
303
R v Latif [1996] 1 WLR 104, para 112-113.
304
R v Horseferry Road Magistrates’ Court, Ex p Bennett [1994] 1 AC 42, para 76C.
305
Including (a) Where a fair trial is impossible, for example because of delays or adverse media publicity (R v Stone [2001] Crim. L.R. 465); (b) where the UK authorities were
involved in the unlawful abduction of a person from a third country to the United Kingdom (also known as ‘rendition’) in order to face trial, even where there was no
question that the subsequent trial was fair (R v Horseferry Road Magistrates’ Court, Ex p Bennett [1994] 1 AC 42 (involving a person abducted from South Africa in gross breach of
his rights and the law of South Africa) and R v Mullen [2000] QB 520 (involving the appeal against conviction for a serious terrorist offence following the suspect’s illegal
abduction from Zimbabwe)); (c) Where the state has procured the commission of a crime through entrapment (R v Looseley, Attorney General’s Reference (No 3 of 2000)
[2001] UKHL 53).
306
See generally, UN Human Rights Committee (HRC), General Comment no. 31, the Nature of the Legal Obligation on States Parties to the Covenant, 26 May 2004,
CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.13.
307
UN General Assembly, Convention Against Torture, Article 14; UN Committee Against Torture, General Comment No. 3 (2012): Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or
Degrading Treatment or Punishment: implementation of article 14 by States parties, 13 December 2012, CAT/C/GC/3.
308
Ndiki Mutua and Others v The Foreign and Commonwealth Office [2012] EWHC 2678 (QB).
309
Wachira Weheire v The Attorney General [2010] eKLR, 21 July 2010 (Kenya); D.K. Basu v State of West Bengal, AIR 1997 SC 610 (India); Dr. Mehmood Nayyar Azam v State of
Chattisgarh and Ors (Civil Appeal No. 5703 of 2012) [2012] 8 SCR 651, 3 Aug. 2012 (India).
310
For example, Nepal: Compensation for Torture Act, 2053, 18 December 1996; USA: Torture Victim Protection Act 28 U.S.C. 1350 (1991).
311
For example, Philippines Compensation Act to Victims of Human Rights Violations, H. No. 5990, 25 Feb. 2013; Chilean Law No. 19.992 Establece pension de reparacion y
otorga otros beneficios, 17 Dec. 2004, modified 10 Dec. 2009; Argentinean Law No. 24.043 of 1991.
312
For example, Guridi v Spain, where the UN Committee Against Torture recognised that in the particular case, reparation for torture needed to ‘cover all the damages suffered by the
victim, which includes, among other measures, restitution, compensation, and rehabilitation of the victim, as well as measures to guarantee the non repetition of the violations, always bearing in mind the
circumstances of each case’ (UN Committee Against Torture, thirty-fourth session, CAT/C/34/D/212/2002, para 6.8).
313
An emphasis of the Nairobi Declaration on Women’s and Girls’ Right to a Remedy and Reparation (International Meeting on Women’s and Girls’ Right to a Remedy and
Reparation, Nairobi, 19-21 March 2007).
314
Arrest Warrant of 11 April 2000 (DRC v Belgium) (Merits) [2002] ICJ Rep 3.
315
Cantoral Benavides v Peru (Reparations and Costs) Ser C no 88 (IACtHR, 3 December 2001), para 78.
316
Loayza Tamayo v Peru (Merits) Ser C no 33 (IACtHR, 17 September 1997), para 84.
317
Fermín Ramírez v Guatemala (Merits, Reparations, Costs) Ser C no 126 (IACtHR, 20 June 2005), para 130(c).
318
Appeal # 2.0000.00.406378-5/000 of the Court of Appeals of the State of Minas Gerais [2004].
319
Convention against Torture, Article 14.
320
Plan de Sánchez Massacre v Guatemala (Reparations) Ser C no 116 (IACtHR, 19 November 2004), para 106-8.
321
Juvenile Reeducation Institute v Paraguay (Preliminary Objections, Merits, Reparations and Costs) Ser C no 112 (IACtHR, 2 September 2004), para 340(13).
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