A/59/324 special care. Relatives are not always prepared to assume such a responsibility or know how to address the problems. Thus, rehabilitation programmes should also include the family of the torture victim. When a person has been tortured for political activities or on suspicion of crime, the victim’s family may also face social ostracism and discrimination. 52. Torture may also have an impact on the local community and, on a larger scale, on a whole society, especially when its practice is widespread or of a systematic nature. The Special Rapporteur observes that in some instances, the purpose of torture is to generate terror among the population, a common strategy in repressive regimes. He notes with concern that systematic rape has been used as a practice of torture to terrorize and humiliate selected ethnic groups. He would like to refer to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, which held in the Akayesu judgement that “[s]exual violence was an integral part of the process of destruction, specifically targeting Tutsi women and specifically contributing to their destruction and to the destruction of the Tutsi group as a whole”.22 The phenomenon of torture is often surrounded by a rule of silence among the population, and sometimes even amongst the torture survivors themselves, which may create or reinforce a sense of loneliness and misunderstanding. The effects of torture may sometimes even be felt in the next generations. 53. Torture of women frequently includes sexual violence with a view to humiliating and degrading the victim. Besides the physical and psychological damage caused by the torture, sexual abuse has additional consequences for women, such as the risk of being infected with sexually transmitted diseases and of pregnancy, miscarriage, forced abortion or sterilization. In a large number of sociocultural contexts, rape and sexual abuse continue to entail the stigmatization and ostracism of the victim upon her return to her community and family. The social stigma attached to rape in most societies often leads to the rejection of the victim by her male relatives. The Special Rapporteur and his predecessors, as well as the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and its consequences have examined issues related to custodial violence against women and the effects of the sexualization of torture against women in previous reports.23 54. The Special Rapporteur continues to receive allegations of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment against children.24 He notes that torture and other forms of ill-treatment have a serious impact on the psyche and development of children who have been subjected to its violence. The effects of torture on children and teenagers will vary, depending on the intensity of the treatment they have been subjected to, but also on the victim’s age, developmental stage and cognitive abilities. Symptoms will be similar to those observed in adults, but children may also develop behaviours that are not appropriate for their age. Torture also has a significant impact on children who have witnessed acts of torture or whose parents or other close family members have been tortured. Children of torture survivors may indeed face problems arising from the post-traumatic behavioural problems of their parents. “The perception of parents as close and important persons who protect their children against danger is changed … Under such conditions one of the children may take on an adult role in the family, taking care of smaller siblings and protecting the mother. This can limit the child’s chances of taking part in age-related activities such as playing with other children, and the child’s own need for support and contact with a reassuring adult is not met. The child’s development may be delayed if there has been no chance to talk with an 15