The launch of The Torture Reporting Handbook

On 24 September, the FCO hosted an event to launch The Torture Reporting Handbook. This is a guide on how to document and respond to allegations within the international system.

Anyone who has seen the horrifying words of a torture survivor written in a report by Freedom from Torture will be appalled at the inhumanity of torture and sexual violence: “I spent over 18 months in this place. It was a cycle of horror. Every few days they would interrogate me, ask me the same questions over and over and over. These sessions were accompanied by torture – burning with cigarettes, beatings with wires. And there was always rape too. I think every guard in that prison had raped me by the time I was released.”

As one of our expert panel, Dr Nora Sveeaas, University of Oslo and a member of the United Nations Sub-Committee on Torture Prevention, reminded us: “voices of survivors of torture are often not heard”. We need to change that. Survivors must be heard and documentation of such crime must be survivor-centred. We have to take a zero tolerance approach to torture. That is why the new edition of the Torture Reporting Handbook is so important.

The reporting from the vital civil society groups around the world makes clear that torture is an everyday reality in dozens of countries. Yet torture is absolutely banned under the United Nations Convention against Torture. This ban is not just a utopian wish. The pathway towards a culture of torture prevention is set out in the Optional Protocol to the Convention. In far too many countries, torture remains commonplace because governments lack the political will to end it.

I am proud that the UK has the will to speak out against torture. As the Prime Minister said, torture is always wrong. The UK, with our partners, stands ready to support those states who wish to strengthen national protection mechanisms. The launch of the new edition of the handbook demonstrates that commitment.

We were delighted to work on this project with the Human Rights Centre at University of Essex and to include on our panel, alongside Dr Sveeaas, Professor Sir Nigel Rodley, Chair of the Human Rights Centre and independent UK member of the UN Human Rights Committee, and Lorna McGregor, Direction of the Human Rights Centre, who gave an overview of their work and insight into this issue.

The launch of a new edition of the Torture Reporting Handbook is our latest contribution to the global drive to end torture. The first edition blazed a trail by offering people on the front line a guide to the practicalities and the legal framework of recording and reporting torture. A lot has happened since then. We have benefited from the insight of so many organisations, not least on the methodology for documenting torture and interviewing torture survivors. The second edition tries to capture that experience, knowledge and expertise. Torture reporting is vital for two reasons. It establishes the evidence base which allows us to prosecute torturers – stripping away the shroud of impunity which so often protects them. And it allows the wider world to understand torture and to act to end it. It is an important tool in all preventative work, and allows a first step to justice and redress for those who often do not have a voice.