Torture and Secret Detentions : The UN Perspective and the Role of the EU

Analiza 02-05-2011

Professor Manfred Nowak, former UN Special Rapporteur on torture, who co-authored in 2010 a major UN report on secret detention with a global scope, concludes that the currently available information underscores the necessity for establishing independent institutions to conduct prompt investigations into any allegation of secret detention. Victims of secret detention should be provided with effective remedies and adequate reparation. He also calls on the European Institutions to support the recommendations of the UN report and to intensify as well as combine their efforts in the fight against impunity for the violations of international and European law related to secret detention. Human rights lawyer Julia Hall, who authored a major report in 2010 on the new evidence linked to rendition and secret detention programmes, states that European Parliament’s past work on accountability for the human rights violations committed in the course of rendition and secret detention programmes should be applauded, but argues that Parliament must continue to play a key role in ensuring the investigations compliant to European Convention on Human Rights are established in all relevant member states, that those responsible for human rights violations are brought to justice, that victims have access to effective redress, and that all necessary steps are taken to ensure that such violations never again occur in the European Union.