A/HRC/13/39/Add.5
5.
The Secretary General of the United Nations has been entrusted to provide the
necessary services to both treaty bodies and Charter-based mechanisms. One of the main
outcomes of the Vienna World Conference of Human Rights 1993 was the creation of the
Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Geneva, which integrated the
former UN Human Rights Centre. But the High Commissioner is more than a simple
secretariat for existing human rights bodies of the United Nations. He or she has the overall
responsibility for ensuring that human rights as one of the three pillars of the United
Nations are effectively promoted and receive the necessary support. The High
Commissioner is expected to speak out when human rights are systematically violated, to
take action vis-à-vis Governments and other powerful actors and to assist Governments in
their endeavours to improve human rights. Independent bodies, such as treaty bodies and
special procedures of the Human Rights Council, play an important role in providing the
High Commissioner with objective information about the factual situation of human rights
around the world.
6.
Since 1 December 2004, I have been entrusted as the fourth mandate holder to carry
out the tasks of the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture (SRT). These tasks have been laid
down in various resolutions of the Commission on Human Rights, the General Assembly
and the Human Rights Council and were developed over the years through the practice of
my predecessors and myself. They are manifold and include the following: to receive and
send on a daily basis individual communications (allegation letters and urgent appeals) to
Governments and to study the respective replies from Governments; to carry out country
missions, follow-up and other visits; to gather reliable information about torture and illtreatment from various sources, including Governments, inter-governmental and nongovernmental organisations, victims and witnesses; to conduct academic research into
certain legal and factual aspects concerning torture; to cooperate with other universal,
regional and national bodies active in the fight against torture; to respond to media requests
and inform the public about torture-related matters; to participate in meetings and
conferences relating to my mandate; to engage in torture-specific training, human rights
education and awareness raising activities and, most importantly, to report regularly to the
Human Rights Council and the General Assembly about my activities and my independent
assessment of the situation of torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment
(CIDT) globally and in relation to specific States, specific groups of individuals (e.g.
women, children, persons with disabilities, detainees, drug-users) or specific aspects of
torture, such as its use in the global fight against terrorism.
7.
In fact, this seems to be an impossible task. How shall one person, with a very small,
although highly professional staff at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human
Rights, be in a position to assess the legal and factual situation of torture in all countries
and to provide respective assistance, cooperation and recommendations to Governments,
civil society and the international community? As an independent UN expert, I am not
employed by the United Nations and do not receive a salary or honorarium. In other words,
I earn my living as full-time Professor of Human Rights at Vienna University and can only
dedicate a certain amount of my time (de facto certainly more than half of my time) to my
function as UN Special Rapporteur for a limited period of six years.
8.
Despite all these shortcomings, I feel that after five years in this position, I am in a
position to provide a fairly comprehensive report about the phenomena of torture, cruel,
inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, including an assessment of conditions of
detention, in our contemporary world. This report is, however, the result of a truly joint
effort by many actors. First of all, I would like to thank all Governments who invited me to
carry out fact-finding missions on their territory and who provided me with the necessary
information to assess the situation of torture and ill-treatment in their countries. The present
report is based primarily on my experiences during these country missions and, therefore,
makes extensive reference to my fact-finding reports. These country-specific references
4