[Author’s Name]
[Institution’s Name]
Essay on Torture
Torture encompasses physically and/or psychologically painful methods designed to elicit information from an individual (interrogational torture) or to silence dissent and force citizens into strict compliance with government policy by brutalizing a limited number of individuals (terrorist torture). While terrorist torture is indifferent to fatal outcomes, and may actually benefit from them, the avowed aim of interrogational torture is repudiated if the victim dies. Fatal outcomes aside, the sequelae of ill-treatment are well documented and endure long after torture ends.
Article 3 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights acknowledges a distinction between torture and inhumane or degrading treatment, but fails to clarify the meaning of torture. The European Court of Human Rights has held that the difference between these categories is determined by the amount of suffering one experiences and has defined torture as the deliberate use of inhumane treatment that causes severe and cruel pain and suffering. (Republic of Ireland v. United Kingdom, 2 Eur. Ct. H.R. 25., 1978) Professor Daniel Stetman, a well-respected scholar on torture, asserts that there is a difference between terrorist torture and interrogational torture. (Daniel Stetman, 1997) Other than the aforementioned, a widely accepted definition of torture is found in Article 1 of the United Nations Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
For the purposes of this Convention, the term "torture" means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination......
