E/CN.4/1992/17 page 101 V. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 275. There is hardly any international legal norm which is so widely acclaimed as the prohibition of torture; and there is hardly any human right which is so densely covered by a network of international instruments and mechanisms. Torture is forbidden under all general human rights conventions, whether universal or regional. Nevertheless, it was deemed necessary to conclude separate conventions specifically dealing with torture which focused on the enforcement of its prohibition, again both at the universal and at the regional level. Fact-finding or monitoring mechanisms have been established in order to strengthen the machinery for the prevention of torture. Such mechanisms include the European Committee on the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights on questions relevant to torture. Moreover, non-governmental organizations have organized worldwide campaigns to rouse public opinion and to bring pressure to bear on Governments with a view to putting an end to the phenomenon of torture. 276. The general revulsion against torture which finds expression in this network of instruments and mechanisms undoubtedly stems from the fact that torture is one of the most ignominious violations of human rights. Respect for human dignity is at the origin of all human rights, as is reflected in the first preambular paragraph of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; torture is the absolute negation of that dignity. 277. The fact that the practice of torture is still widespread may partly be explained by the fact that it concerns a human right which can be violated very easily, since it is the most intimate of human rights violations. Torture almost invariably takes place in isolation, in the detention cell, in the interrogation room, in the torture chamber. Moreover, it is anonymous: the victim hardly ever sees the face of his torturer, since in most cases he is blindfolded or hooded. The first condition for mutual respect, eye-to-eye contact, is wilfully denied. The victim is turned into an object. The torturer has no face for the victims, but very often he has no face either to his fellow men in society. Only his co-perpetrators know his face. The torturer is part of a gang. Since no man is born a torturer, he is drawn into a web which encloses him gradually but unrelentingly and from which he is hardly ever able to disentangle himself. And within the sub-group to which he belongs, rationalizations for the practice of torture are made: the torturer finds the arguments to explain to himself the inner logic of his behaviour. 278. In the context of a research project undertaken by Projects for the Interdisciplinary Study of Root Causes of Human Rights Violations (PIOOM), of Leiden University (the Netherlands), to explore the causes of torture, interviews were held with 49 military officers in four Latin American countries which during the 1970s and 1980s were notorious for the practice of torture. All these officers had either been responsible for torture practices or had actively participated in them. The research project has not yet been concluded, but from the interviews it became clear that almost without exception the use of torture was seen as the only means of getting to the truth rapidly, and rapidity was considered to be essential. The subjects stated that "the opponent" (whether guerrilla units or "terrorists") often