The UN Special Rapporteur on Torture has also challenged the use of “stress and duress” techniques during interrogation and in particular subjecting detainees to prolonged standing or kneeling, hooding, blindfolding with spray-painted goggles, sleep deprivation and 24-hour lighting, and also the keeping of detainees in painful or awkward positions.359 Even in the context of interrogation and investigations into acts of terrorism, there can be no necessity defence for subjecting a suspect to torture or inhuman or degrading treatment. The HRC has firmly rejected such arguments of the defence of necessity.360 As far as interrogation techniques are concerned, international human rights law has identified the following practices, inter alia, to be in violation of the absolute protection from torture, inhuman degrading treatment and punishment: • suspending someone by their arms; • rape; • deprivation of the natural senses, such as sight or hearing, or of awareness of place and the passing of time; • methods of interrogation that impair decision-making capacity or judgement; • unduly lengthy interrogations; • coercion into signing false confessions; • mock executions and the threat thereof; • thumb presses; • immersion in blood, urine, vomit and excrement; • medical experimentation; • electric shocks; • overcrowded and cold conditions; • threats to family; • deliberate destruction of homes and communities; • sleep deprivation; • hooding; • blindfolding; • wall standing; • use of noise; • deprivation of food and water; • humiliation. Even in the context of counter-terrorism, only normal investigative procedures are authorized.361 As a matter of international human rights law, security-service investigators are not 359 Report of the UN Special Rapporteur on the Question of Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, Theo van Boven, doc. E/CN.4/2004/56/Add.1, para. 1813. 360 The Human Right Committee stated that “[…] is concerned that interrogation techniques incompatible with Article 7 of the Covenant are still reported frequently to be resorted to and the ‘necessity defence’ argument, which is not recognised under the Covenant, is often invoked and retained as a justification for […] actions in the course of investigations. The State party should review its recourse to the ‘necessity defence’ argument”, op. cit., note 131, HRC, Concluding observations: Israel, para. 18. 361 “[W]e declare that the GSS does not have the authority to “shake” a man, hold him in the ‘Shabach’ position (which includes the combination of various methods, as mentioned in paragraph 30), force him into a ‘frog crouch’ position and deprive him of sleep in a manner other than that which is inherently required by the interrogation. Likewise, we declare that the ‘necessity’ defence, found in the Penal Law, cannot serve as a basis of authority for the use of these interrogation practices, or for the existence of directives pertaining to GSS investigators, allowing them to employ interrogation practices of this kind”, Supreme Court of Israel, Public Committee Against Torture v. State of Israel, HCJ 5100/94, 6 September 1999. 128 Countering Terrorism, Protecting Human Rights