Ten torture cases to be used by Amnesty (The Guardian, 11 Oktober 1973)

=== [PDF page 1] === Ten torture cases to be used by Amnesty Cole, Peter The Guardian (1959-2009); Oct 11, 1973; ProQuest Ten torture cases to be used by Amnesty _ The torture of political and religious prisoners continues in many counties, Amnesty International said yesterday. Amnesty has declared a Prisoner of Conscience Week, starting on Sunday, and it is using it ta publicise 10 particularly” horrific cases of torture which, it says, merely symbolise the plight of thousands of men and- women. Mr Victor Jokel, director of Amnesty, said: “ The 10 cases represent a very small sample of. the countless victims subjected to torture. iorture today is so widespread an instrument of political repression that we can speak of the existence of torture States as a political reality of our times.” Torture, he said, contravened Article Five of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, to which most countries were signatories. One of the cases Amnesty is publicising concerns Osman Saffet Arolat, editor of a Socialist weekly called Ant, who is in prison in Turkey for producing Communist propaganda. By PETER COLE He describes what happened to him: “They tied my feet and beat my soles with sticks. One of them put a chair on my head and sat on it. They were swearing at me_ constantly. Meanwhile, one of them kept, spitting at-me, As I tried to cover my face he was kicking my arms and hands. One superintendent jumped from his chair and said: * You haven’t received your fair share from me yet.’ “Then he came nearer and threw first a right and then a left punch at me. At the same time two of them were kicking’ me. The short one who previously tried to push a stick into me and -who is a_ sexually deviated person was insulting my wife as if he were caught up in a sex hysteria.” Pindiso Zimambane, -who belonged to the Unity Movement in South Africa. and was arrested by the security police in 1970, was given electric shock torture. First he was beaten with sticks, and ‘then two metal clips were attached to his ears and he was made to lie on the floor. He felt enormous pain through his body and he was questioned during the shocks. He was left overnight -handcuffed to a tree. The next morning the electric shock torture was repeated, this time. with the terminals attached to” his genitals ‘and toes.. Mrs Sri Ambar- was head of the women’s department of the All-Indonesian Trade Union Federation. ‘ After. she had been arrested in-1966 she was stripped naked, beaten, and hung by her wrists from a tree through one night. Later, one of her inquisitors ‘stabbed a dagger into her'thigh and as she tried to stop the. blood with her hands ‘she was stabbed again, this time in the buttock. Her two daughters. and her mother were beatenup in front of her. Mr Jokel said that urgent action should be taken by Governments. There was incontrovertible evidence of daily barbarity, yet Governments showed their impotence by pursuing the doctrine of non-interference in torture States’ affairs. Amnesty is collecting signatures during the week for an international appeal for the abolition of torture which will be presented to the United Nations. A conference is being held in London on torture on Saturday. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.