56 United Nations Convention Against Torture and its Optional Protocol torture in accordance with Article 1.  In EN v Burundi, the State party argued that the act of severe beatings committed by police officers in a police station after arrest cannot be classified as torture because the Burundian Criminal Code requires that acts of torture must be committed to obtain information or a confession.188 The Committee concluded that the beating was most likely undertaken in order to punish him for an act he was thought to have committed. In both of the cases the Committee seems to have followed the approach stipulated in its General Comment, namely that the elements of intent and purpose do not involve a subjective inquiry into the motivation of the perpetrators, but there must instead be ‘objective determinations under the circumstances’.189 113  The Committee has recognized that in comparison to torture, other forms of ill-​treatment do ‘not require proof of impermissible purposes’ and therefore has acknowledged purpose as a decisive criterion to distinguish torture from other forms of ill-​treatment.190 Thus the definition of torture does not necessarly depend on a subjectively verified purpose or intensity of the inflicted pain or suffering, but on the intentionality and purposefulness of that infliction in combination with the powerlessness of the victim.191 3.1.5  Powerlessness 114  All purposes listed in Article 1 as well as the travaux préparatoires of both the Declaration and the Convention seem to refer to a situation in which the victim of torture is a detainee or a person ‘at least under the factual power or control of the person inflicting the pain or suffering’,192 and where the perpetrator uses this unequal and powerful situation to achieve a certain effect, such as the extraction of information, intimidation, or punishment. The ‘ideal’ environment for torture is prolonged incommunicado detention in a secret place, ie a situation in which the victim is totally subordinated to the will and power of the torturer. Such a situation of powerlessness strongly resembles the condition of slavery, and both torture and slavery can be described as most direct and brutal attacks on the core of human dignity and personality. This link between the right to human dignity and the absolute prohibition of torture and slavery has been established most convincingly in Article 5 ACHPR.193 115 The UNSRT has confirmed that powerlessness means that ‘someone is overpowered, in other words, has come under the direct physical or equivalent control of the   EN v Burundi, No 578/​2013 (n 106) para 4.4.   CAT/​C/​GC/​2 (n 88) para 9. For EN v Burundi, No 578/​2013 (n 106) see CAT/​C/​56/​D/​578/​2013, paras 4.4, 7.2, 7.3. 190   CAT/​C/​GC/​2 (n 88) para 10. See also above 3.1.2.1. 191   A/​HRC/​13/​39 (n 99), para 60; A/​HRC/​13/​39/​Add.5 (n 99) para. 37; A/​72/​178 (n 99) para 31. 192   Burger and Danelius (n 32) 120. See also Rodley, ‘The Definition(s) of Torture’ (n 23) 484: ‘It is no accident that the purposive element of torture reflects precisely state purposes or, at any rate, the purposes of an organized political entity exercising effective power’. 193   ‘Every individual shall have the right to the respect of the dignity inherent in a human being and to the recognition of his legal status. All forms of exploitation and degradation of man particularly slavery, slave trade, torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment and treatment shall be prohibited.’ See also Chapter I of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights on human dignity. In the State reporting procedure under the CAT the Committee has also asked Mauritania to criminalize slavery and to include an adequate definition, covering all forms of slavery in its legislation. See CAT, ‘Concluding Observations: Mauritania’ (2013) UN Doc CAT/​ C/​MRT/​CO/​1, para  21. 188 189 Zach