UN TREATY BODIES 1 While allegations of incommunicado detention and enforced disappearances have in the past been addressed mainly by the HRC and CAT, there will soon be a Committee on Enforced Disappearances mandated to deal specifically with these issues.201 It is likely that the number of individual complaints of enforced disappearances considered by the HRC and CAT will decrease as more states ratify the new treaty. However, there is a possibility that the functions of this new Committee may eventually be subsumed by one of the existing treaty bodies, with the HRC perhaps the most likely candidate.202 – ICCPR As noted by the HRC in its General Comment on Article 7, “keeping under systematic review interrogation rules, instructions, methods and practices as well as arrangements for the custody and treatment of persons subjected to any form of arrest, detention or imprisonment is an effective means of preventing cases of torture and ill-treatment. To guarantee the effective protection of detained persons, provisions should be made for detainees to be held in places officially recognized as places of detention and for their names and places of detention, as well as for the names of persons responsible for their detention, to be kept in registers readily available and accessible to those concerned, including relatives and friends… Provisions should also be made against incommunicado detention.”203 Many of the cases of incommunicado detention considered by the HRC also include allegations of other types of ill-treatment during the period for which contact with the outside world was denied. However, incommunicado detention alone can constitute a violation of Article 10(1) ICCPR, even when it is for a relatively short period.204 Where the period of incommunicado detention is prolonged, it may amount to cruel and inhuman treatment, or even torture. In El-Megreisi v Libya, the HRC found that the victim, “by being subjected to prolonged incommunicado detention [of more than three years] in an unknown location, [was] the victim of torture and cruel and inhuman treatment, in violation of articles 7 and 10, paragraph 1, of the Covenant.” 205 From its jurisprudence, it is clear that the HRC considers that the practice of enforced disappearances “is inseparably linked to treatment that amounts to a Ibid. Article 26. Ibid. Article 27. 203 HRC, General Comment No. 20, 1992, §11. 204 Arutyunyan v Uzbekistan, HRC Communication No. 917/2000, 29 March 2004, §6.2. In this case, the incommunicado detention was for a period of two weeks. 205 El-Megreisi v Libya, HRC Communication No. 440/1990, 23 March 1994, §5.4. 201 202 44