A/75/179 and purposefully inflicted, fail to meet the required threshold of “severity” (see A/73/207, para. 45). A strong trivializing effect is also achieved by States avoiding or preventing the prosecution and punishment of torture and ill-treatment or introducing justifications or statutes of limitations for such crimes or granting amnesties a nd pardons to perpetrators. 43 54. In practice, States have adopted policies, underinclusive definitions or interpretations, legislation and judgments trivializing a broad range of conduct involving torture and ill-treatment, including coercive interrogation, police brutality, excessive use of force, violent deterrence of migrants, gender-based violence, psychological torture, cyberharassment and domestic violence. By granting impunity for such abuse, States overtly discredit the universal, absolute and non-derogable prohibition of torture and illtreatment, violate their legal obligations, belittle the gravity of the crimes and actively suppress the moral dilemma arising from such practices. In practice, the resulting expectation of impunity consolidates public and institutional complacency and encourages the continued proliferation of torture and ill-treatment. 55. Furthermore, States routinely trivialize the seriousness of the concerns raised by international human rights mechanisms, either by failing to respond or by adopting an inappropriately formalistic, dismissive or aggressive response. Paradoxically, some States have bilaterally suggested that the Special Rapporteur “trivialized” the legal definitions of torture and ill-treatment by including within their scope such widespread practices as the deterrence of migrants, domestic violence and public mobbing. Most alarmingly, however, three permanent members of the Security Council, which should be expected to honour their privileges through lea dership by example, have adopted an overtly hostile stance towards international human rights mechanisms. Thus, the United States of America has not only officially withdrawn from the Human Rights Council, but also threatened staff of the International Criminal Court with sanctions for any criminal investigation against personnel of the United States, 44 China has called for special procedures mandate holders to be held “accountable” for “misconduct”, condemning their official communication of human rights concerns as “nonsense” that “severely infringed upon China’s sovereignty, interfered in its internal affairs and flagrantly violated the Charter of the United Nations” 45 and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has repeatedly dismissed official communications and reports by Special Rapporteurs as “inflammatory”, “political”, “biased” and “interfering” with the British judiciary. 46 2. Utilitarian justification 56. Although international law leaves no doubt as to the fact that the prohibition of torture and ill-treatment is absolute and non-derogable, recent history is replete with attempts at justifying such abuse based on utilitarian “exceptions” (art. 2 (2) of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or __________________ 43 44 45 46 20-09728 Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, “Torture is to rture, and waterboarding is not an exception – UN expert urges the US not to reinstate it”, 30 January 2017; Communications: AL ISR 7/2018 of 31 January 2018; OL GBR 6/2020 of 15 June 2020; AL GBR 4/2019 of 19 August 2019. United States of America, Executive Order No. 13928 of 11 June 2020. Response by China of 26 June 2020 to Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, “UN experts call for decisive measures to protect fundamental freedoms in China”, 26 June 2020, available at www.china-un.ch/eng/hom/t1792660.htm. See A/HRC/41/39/Add.3; Official complaint to the Secretary-General of the United Nations by Grant Shapps, Minister and Member of Parliament of t he United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (11 September 2013); Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom, reacting on Twitter on 31 May 2019 to Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, “UN expert says ‘collective persecution’ of Julian Assange must end now”, 31 May 2019, available at https://twitter.com/Jeremy_Hunt/status/1134373848290353152?s=20 . 17/25