George Orwell understood the essence of totalitarianism and torture. It was from the darkest recesses of his imagination that we get Room 101, the dungeon within the Ministry of Love where “thought criminals” are confronted with their deepest fears. Winston Smith, the protagonist of 1984, feared rodents and so his torturers decided he should be eaten alive by starving rats. The resulting terror is so intense that Winston not only renounces every subversive thought in his head, but denounces the love of his life, Julia, begging the Thought Police to torture her instead. Only after this final betrayal does Winston’s ordeal cease.

In 1949 when Orwell first exposed us to the world of Big Brother, there were less than 30 democracies across the globe. Dictatorships, fading autocracies and colonial powers still ruled over most of the world’s population. Millions of people went to sleep at night fearing their secret police’s own version of Room 101.

The year before Orwell’s 1984 was published, 48 out of 58 states at the fledgling United Nations voted in favor of adopting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Despite the Cold War, the following decades saw the incremental advancement of human rights norms and laws. “Orwellian” became a pejorative term, deployed to denounce acts of institutional cruelty, sinister surveillance and thought control. And in the real-life year of 1984, appropriately enough, the UN finally adopted the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment or Punishment. This was a historic achievement.

Since then 175 states have ratified the Convention against Torture. But reporting by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch suggests that roughly half the UN membership still use torture or other forms of systematic abuse or ill-treatment against detainees, despite this global prohibition.

Last year, the Center for Victims of Torture (CVT) extended care to nearly 18,000 torture survivors and their family members, with clients coming from 69 different countries. I meet these people every day in the refugee camps, clinics and offices where we work around the world. Many of them have experienced real-life horrors to rival Room 101. But the survivors usually talk about healing and rebuilding their lives instead. Many also speak about their enduring thirst for justice. 

Many of them have experienced real-life horrors to rival Room 101. But the survivors usually talk about healing and rebuilding their lives instead.”

In some countries and courts that is now possible because the Convention against Torture centered victims in a way that previous laws and treaties did not. The Convention enshrines the legal principle of “non-refoulement,” prohibiting a country from handing someone back to their torturers. As a result, since 2002 several major cases at the International Criminal Court and elsewhere have heard testimony from torture survivors whose refugee status enabled them to safely confront perpetrators in court.

The Convention also ensures that all survivors have the right to rehabilitation. When the Convention was adopted, it bolstered the role of the UN Voluntary Fund for Victims of Torture, which supports torture treatment centers worldwide.

The United States has a complex and contradictory history when it comes to torture. Republican President Ronald Reagan signed the Convention in 1988, describing torture as “an abhorrent practice” that the U.S. had a global responsibility to eradicate. Ten years later, Democratic President Bill Clinton signed the Torture Victims Relief Act, which provided funding for rehabilitation centers for the first time. There are now 49 such centers across the U.S., including those run by CVT. The U.S. also remains the UN Voluntary Fund’s largest contributor.

And yet, in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the United States turned to torture under the guise of so-called “enhanced interrogation.” Doing so clearly violated the Convention, eroded the United States’ moral standing, and made the country less safe. There has still been no meaningful accountability for the perpetrators of those crimes. 

Torture is morally repugnant and always illegal, regardless of what political euphemisms it is cloaked in, or what dubious security rationale is invoked.”

Torture is morally repugnant and always illegal, regardless of what political euphemisms it is cloaked in, or what dubious security rationale is invoked. Torture is not about the extraction of information. The U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee’s 2014 report revealed that even in the CIA’s own analysis, “intelligence” derived from waterboarding and other forms of torture was unreliable and largely unusable. Torture is and has always been about terror and submission.

Unfortunately, with more than 120 million people around the world currently displaced by persecution, conflict and atrocities, it feels like torture is on the rise again globally. But it is fitting that the Convention’s fortieth anniversary falls just days after the cell doors of Syria’s notorious Sednaya prison have finally been forced open, exposing torture perpetrated on an industrial scale by the former Assad dictatorship. Often called the “human slaughterhouse,” Sednaya is a reminder to us all that although we have made tremendous progress over the past four decades, the work of the Convention is not complete.

That work will not end until the last torturer faces international justice and the last refugee camp is empty.”

Human rights work never stops, regardless of who is in the White House or any other parliament or palace. That work will not end until the last torturer faces international justice and the last refugee camp is empty. On the 40^th anniversary of the Convention against Torture, we should recommit to making Room 101 fiction again.

About The Author

Dr. Simon Adams is President & CEO at CVT

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