A/HRC/25/60 that evidence has not been obtained by torture, a court must rely on evidence other that the testimony of the investigating officer. 10 26. Although the exclusionary rule is not expressly listed among the rules that apply both to torture and to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment,11 the Committee against Torture, as the authoritative interpreter of the Convention, has made it clear that statements and confessions obtained under all forms of ill-treatment must be excluded.12 This ambiguity has led some courts to decide that the exclusionary rule does not apply when the ill-treatment that has resulted in a confession does not reach the gravity required for torture. The Human Rights Committee has authoritatively interpreted Article 7 of the ICCPR and found that the exclusionary rule applies to both torture and other ill-treatment.13 Similarly, the Committee against Torture in its General comment No. 2 has held that “articles 3 to 15 of the Convention are likewise obligatory as applied to both, torture and other ill-treatment (para. 6).”14 Also, the 1975 UN General Assembly Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Being Subjected to Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment explicitly includes statements made under cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.15 27. Some States have deemed evidence obtained in a third State as a result of torture or ill-treatment admissible as long as this evidence had been extracted without the complicity of the authorities. However, the exclusionary rule applies no matter where in the world the torture was perpetrated and even if the State seeking to rely on the information had no previous involvement in or connection to the acts of torture.16 28. The exclusionary rule applies not only where the victim of the treatment contrary to the prohibition of torture or other ill-treatment is the actual defendant but also where third parties are concerned. Such a conclusion is plainly intended by the wording of article 15, which provides that “any statement […] in any proceedings” shall come within the scope of exclusion, and not just one given by the accused in a domestic court. The Committee against Torture, the European Court and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights have firmly ruled against the use of torture-tainted evidence extracted from third parties, regardless of whether such evidence may be used in domestic proceedings or in proceedings in a third state.17 29. The exclusionary rule extends not only to confessions and other statements obtained under torture, but also to all other pieces of evidence subsequently obtained through legal means but which originated in an act of torture.18 In some jurisdictions, this approach is 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Swart and Fowkes, “The regulation of Detention in the Age of Terror – Lessons from the Apartheid Experience,” 126 S. African L. J. 780 2009 Article 16 Committee against Torture, General comment No. 2 (CAT/C/GC/2), para. 6 Human Rights Committee General comment No. 32 (2007), para. 41; see also Guidelines on the Role of Prosecutors, adopted by the Eighth United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, Cuba, 27 August to 7 September 1990, A/CONF.144/28/Rev.1 (1990); International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, Second Annual Report, amendment to Rule 95, A/50/365-S/1995/728. See also C. Inglese, The UN Committee against Torture: and assessment, Kluwer Law International: The Hague (2001), p. 365 Article 12 CAT/C/CR/33/3, para. 4 See e.g. Ktiti v. Morocco, CAT/C/46/D/419/2010 (CAT); El Haski v. Belgium; Application no. 649/08, ECHR (2012), para. 85; Cabrera García and Montiel Flores v. México, IACHR (2010), Series C No. 220, para. 167 (including evidence obtained under duress) 7