Torture by Police, Forced Disappearance & Other Ill Treatment In the early years of the 21st Century, 2000 to
2025 gvnet.com/torture/UK.htm
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CAUTION: The following links
have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in the UK. Some of these links may lead to websites
that present allegations that are unsubstantiated or even false. No
attempt has been made to validate their authenticity or to verify their content. HOW TO USE THIS WEBPAGE Students If you are looking
for material to use in a term-paper, you are advised to scan the postings on
this page and others to see which aspects of Torture by Authorities are of
particular interest to you. You might
be interested in exploring the moral justification for inflicting pain or
inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment in order to obtain critical
information that may save countless lives, or to elicit a confession for a
criminal act, or to punish someone to teach him a lesson outside of the courtroom. Perhaps your paper might focus on some of
the methods of torture, like fear, extreme temperatures, starvation, thirst,
sleep deprivation, suffocation, or immersion in freezing water. On the other hand, you might choose to
write about the people acting in an official capacity who perpetrate such
cruelty. There is a lot to the subject
of Torture by Authorities. Scan other
countries as well as this one. Draw
comparisons between activity in adjacent countries and/or regions. Meanwhile, check out some of the Term-Paper resources
that are available on-line. ***
ARCHIVES *** 2020 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices: United Kingdom U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor,
30 March 2021 www.state.gov/reports/2020-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/united-kingdom/
[accessed 11 August
2021] TORTURE AND OTHER
CRUEL, INHUMAN, OR DEGRADING TREATMENT OR PUNISHMENT The law prohibits
such practices, but there were a few reports that government officials
employed them. Impunity was not a
problem in the security forces. The Independent Office for Police Conduct,
Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services,
and Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons carried out investigations into
complaints of abuses by security forces. The United Kingdom’s (UK’s) College
of Policing incorporates human rights-oriented guidance on policing into its
Authorized Professional Practice, the official source of policing practice. The CPT’s report on
its visit to Scotland expressed concern about the use of “long-term
segregation” and recommended that “alternatives…should urgently be
considered.” UN rapporteur on
torture ‘scared to find out more about our democracies’ after delving into
Assange case RT News [Russian
Federation], 9 May 2020 www.rt.com/news/488227-un-turture-democracies-assange/ [accessed 10 May
2020] Discovering that
the cruelty visited on Julian Assange by Western democracies had been
premeditated has heightened the fear of learning more about how those
democracies operate, the UN’s rapporteur on torture has admitted. For years Nils
Melzer has been researching on behalf of the UN just how vile and degrading
the mistreatment of prisoners can become. But learning that states that are
supposed to be champions of human rights can be as brutal as any other with
people who cross them was quite a shock. The case that made Melzer reassess
his beliefs is that of Julian Assange, who, he says, had signs of "prolonged
psychological torture" while in the UK. Freedom House
Country Report 2020 Edition freedomhouse.org/country/united-kingdom/freedom-world/2020 [accessed 15 May
2020] F3. IS THERE
PROTECTION FROM THE ILLEGITIMATE USE OF PHYSICAL FORCE AND FREEDOM FROM WAR
AND INSURGENCIES? While prisons
generally adhere to international guidelines, problems of overcrowding, violence, self-harm, and drugs in prisons have worsened in
the 2010s, and were noted by the chief inspector of prisons for England and
Wales in his 2018–19 annual report. Conditions in some British prisons have
earned recent scrutiny in Parliament. Prison chiefs were questioned over the
living conditions in Her Majesty’s Prison (HMP) Liverpool after a 2018
surprise inspection recorded squalid living conditions. Council of Europe
anti-torture Committee publishes report on the United Kingdom Executive Summary,
30 April 2020 [accessed 31 May
2020] In May 2019, the
CPT carried out a targeted follow-up visit to England to focus on the
persistently high levels of violence
in the adult
and juvenile prison estates,
as well as
on broader concerns
regarding regimes, the use of
force, segregation and means of
restraint. The visit follows up on serious
concerns raised during the CPT’s April 2016 periodic visit to the
United Kingdom; notably, the lack of safety for inmates and staff in prisons
in England, prison violence spiralling out of
control, poor regimes and chronic overcrowding. Nevertheless, the
ineluctable fact remains that the prison system is in deep crisis. During the
2019 visit, the CPT’s delegation found that the local male prisons visited
remained violent, unsafe and overcrowded, with many inmates enduring
restricted and isolating regimes and/or long periods of segregation. A
similar state of affairs was also found in the two young offender
institutions visited. Lastly, a new and
deeply concerning finding was the infliction of unjustified violence by staff
on prisoners in two of the three prisons visited, namely Liverpool and
Wormwood Scrubs. Of utmost concern was the evolution of
an informal practice
of “preventive strikes”
(i.e., “preventively” punching
compliant prisoners whom staff perceived might, at some point in the
future, become a threat). The CPT recommends that the United Kingdom
authorities explicitly prohibit the reprehensible practice of “preventive
strikes” by prison officers on inmates and, more generally, undertake a
proper investigation into all allegations of ill-treatment and ensure that
prison staff understand why ill-treatment is unlawful and will result in
severe disciplinary sanctions or criminal prosecution. The CPT’s 2019
visit findings reinforce sustained criticism by civil society, Parliamentary
Committees and Her Majesty’s Inspector of Prisons regarding the overall lack
of safety of the male adult prison estate. The CPT recognises
that the measures taken by the authorities to date, as outlined in the
report, represent a positive start but they remain insufficient to address
the root causes of the current prison crisis. Deeper, more comprehensive,
effective and adequately financed reforms that are sustainable in the long
term are still urgently required. Men ‘Beaten,
Deprived of Sleep, Food and Water’ Not Tortured, Says New Ruling Corallina Lopez Curzi, 21 March 2018 rightsinfo.org/still-not-torture/ [accessed 25 March
2018] At the peak period
of the Troubles, a group of ‘high value’ prisoners were subjected to ‘deep
interrogation’ – which means they were exposed to treatments aimed at causing
intense physical and psychological pain. The idea was to coerce them into
confessing, despite the overwhelming evidence that intelligence obtained by
torture has no value whatsoever. Amongst the deep
interrogation methods employed by the British, ‘five techniques‘
in particular stood out: deprivation of sleep, deprivation of food and
drink, stress positions, hooding and subjection to ‘white noise’. The men
also claimed they were beaten. Conclusions
and recommendations of the Committee against Torture U.N. Convention
against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment -- Doc. CAT/C/CR/33/3
(2004) www1.umn.edu/humanrts/cat/observations/uk2004.html [accessed 12 March
2013] 4. The Committee
expresses its concern at: (a) remaining
inconsistencies between the requirements of the Convention and the provisions
of the State party's domestic law which, even after the passage of the Human
Rights Act, have left continuing gaps; notably: (i) article 15 of the
Convention prohibits the use of evidence gained by torture wherever and by
whomever obtained; notwithstanding the State party's assurance set out in
paragraph 3 (g), supra, the State party's law has been interpreted to exclude
the use of evidence extracted by torture only where the State party's
officials were complicit; and (ii) article 2 of
the Convention provides that no exceptional circumstances whatsoever may be
invoked as a justification for torture; the text of Section 134(4) of the
Criminal Justice Act however provides for a defence of "lawful
authority, justification or excuse" to a charge of official intentional
infliction of severe pain or suffering, a defence which is not restricted by
the Human Rights Act for conduct outside the State party, where the Human
Rights Act does not apply; moreover, the text of section 134(5) of the
Criminal Justice Act provides for a defence for conduct that is permitted
under foreign law, even if unlawful under the State party's law; (b) the State
party's limited acceptance of the applicability of the Convention to the
actions of its forces abroad, in particular its explanation that "those
parts of the Convention which are applicable only in respect of territory
under the jurisdiction of a State party cannot be applicable in relation to
actions of the United Kingdom in Afghanistan and Iraq"; the Committee
observes that the Convention protections extend to all territories under the
jurisdiction of a State party and considers that this principle includes all
areas under the de facto effective control of the State party's authorities; (c) the incomplete
factual and legal grounds advanced to the Committee justifying the
derogations from the State party's international human rights obligations and
requiring the emergency powers set out in Part IV of the Anti-terrorism,
Crime and Security Act 2001; similarly, with respect to Northern Ireland, the
absence of precise information on the necessity for the continued emergency
provisions for that jurisdiction contained in the Terrorism Act 2000; (d) the State
party's reported use of diplomatic assurances in the "refoulement"
context in circumstances where its minimum standards for such assurances,
including effective post-return monitoring arrangements and appropriate due
process guarantees followed, are not wholly clear and thus cannot be assessed
for compatibility with article 3 of the Convention; (e) the State
party's resort to potentially indefinite detention under the Anti-terrorism,
Crime and Security Act 2001 of foreign nationals suspected of involvement in
international terrorism and the strict regime applied in Belmarsh prison; (f) the
investigations carried out by the State party into a number of deaths by
lethal force arising between the entry into force of the Convention in 1988
and the Human Rights Act in 2000 which have failed to fully meet its
international obligations; (g) reports of
unsatisfactory conditions in the State party's detention facilities including
substantial numbers of deaths in custody, inter-prisoner violence,
overcrowding and continued use of "slopping out" sanitation
facilities, as well as reports of unacceptable conditions for female
detainees in the Hydebank Wood prison, including a lack of gender-sensitive
facilities, policies, guarding and medical aid, with male guards alleged to
constitute 80% of guarding staff and incidents of inappropriate threats and
incidents affecting female detainees; Human
Rights in the United Kingdom Human Rights Watch [accessed 15
February 2013] The European Court
of Human Rights and domestic Human Rights Act face ongoing political and
media attack in the UK. A draft law before Parliament would widen the use of
secret hearings in civil courts when national security is invoked,
undermining accountability for abuses by UK officials. Criminal
investigations and civil cases on alleged UK complicity in torture and
rendition to Gadaffi-era Libya continue, although a wider inquiry into UK
complicity in rendition has been shelved. NGOs had boycotted the inquiry over
lack of transparency and independence. Former
internees claim 'new evidence' of Army torture Vincent Kearney, BBC
NI home affairs correspondent, BBC News, Northern Ireland, 28 November 2013 www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-25137411 [accessed 30 Nov
2013] On their way to the
interrogation centre in 1971, the interned men were hooded and thrown to the ground
from helicopters. They had been told
they were hundreds of feet in the air, but were actually just a few feet from
the ground. They were then
subjected to what the Army referred to as "the five
techniques". They were beaten,
deprived of sleep, food and water, and forced to stand in a stress position
against a wall for long periods.
"The noise was indescribable, like steam coming from a boiler at
a high rate," said former internee Gerry McKerr. "We were put
against the wall and told to hold the position for as long as we could. On
falling, we were beaten and placed back against the wall again. "I collapsed innumerable times and
was beaten each time," Mr McKerr said. AMNESTY
INTERNATIONAL From an old article -- URL not available Article was published
sometime prior to 2015 TORTURE AND OTHER
ILL-TREATMENT
- On 12 January, the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) and the Director of
Public Prosecutions announced that, following an investigation, criminal
charges would not be brought in two cases against UK intelligence officers
alleged to be involved in the ill-treatment of detainees abroad. The first
case related to involvement in the torture and other ill-treatment of Binyam
Mohamed, the second to an unnamed individual held by US authorities at Bagram
Air Base in Afghanistan in January 2002. However, the MPS stated that it had
received other allegations, and was considering possible further criminal
investigations. Criminal
investigations were announced, however, into UK involvement in the alleged
rendition of Sami al Saadi and Abdel Hakim Belhaj to Libya in 2004 and their
reported torture and ill-treatment. In December, Sami al Saadi and his family
accepted a financial settlement from the government. A civil claim for
damages brought by Abdel Hakim Belhaj against UK authorities remained pending
at the end of the year. On 18 January, the
government announced that because of the new criminal investigations
concerning alleged renditions to Libya, the Detainee Inquiry would conclude
early. The Detainee Inquiry had been established in 2010 to examine
allegations of UK involvement in human rights violations of individuals
detained abroad in the context of counter-terrorism operations. However, it
fell short of international human rights standards for effective, independent
and thorough investigations. On 27 June, the Detainee Inquiry provided the
government with a report on its work to date, which remained unpublished at
the end of year. Search … AMNESTY
INTERNATIONAL For more
articles:: Search Amnesty
International’s website www.amnesty.org/en/search/?q=uk+torture&ref=&year=&lang=en&adv=1&sort=relevance [accessed 20 January 2019] Scroll
Down ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** Human
Rights Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, March 8, 2006 www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61683.htm [accessed 15
February 2013] 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61683.htm [accessed 7 July
2019] TORTURE
AND OTHER CRUEL, INHUMAN, OR DEGRADING TREATMENT OR PUNISHMENT – Although the law
prohibits such practices, there were complaints that individual members of
the police occasionally abused detainees. On December 8, the House of Lords
Judicial Committee reversed an appeals court decision and ruled that even in
terrorism cases no court could consider evidence obtained through torture. Freedom House
Country Report - Political Rights: 1 Civil Liberties: 1 Status: Free 2009 Edition www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2009/united-kingdom [accessed 15
February 2013] LONG
URL ç 2009 Country Reports begin on Page 21 [accessed 13 May
2020] The terrorist
attacks led to government proposals to toughen antiterrorism laws, which in
turn sparked concerns about civil liberties. The proposals, first introduced
in August 2005, were wide ranging, although one of Blair’s first measures was
defeated. Instead of extending the time terrorism suspects could be held
without detention from 14 to 90 days, the Commons extended the period to 28
days. In another government setback, the Law Lords, the highest court in
Britain, ruled in December that evidence obtained through torture could not
be used at trial. All
material used herein reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107
for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT
ARTICLES. Cite this
webpage as: Patt, Prof. Martin, "Torture by Police, Forced Disappearance
& Other Ill Treatment in the early years of the 21st Century- United
Kingdom UK", http://gvnet.com/torture/UK.htm, [accessed <date>] |
