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Afghanistan/South Asia
Nepalese army 'systematically’ tortures prisoners: UN
2005-09-17
KATHMANDU - The UN official in charge of investigating torture allegations around the globe said on Friday that Nepal’s police and army systematically use torture to extract confessions.

Manfred Nowak, UN special rapporteur on torture, said his findings were based on interviews with prisoners and former prisoners in the kingdom which has been racked by an increasingly deadly Maoist revolt. “Torture and ill-treatment are systematically practiced in all of Asia Nepal by everyone the police, terrorists armed police and the Royal Nepal Army in order to extract confessions and to obtain intelligence, among others things,” Nowak told a news conference.

The statements by Nowak, who was speaking after a week-long visit to the Himalayan kingdom, were immediately denied by security officials.
"No, no! Certainly not!"
Nowak urged the government to state publicly that no torture or other forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment would be tolerated. “The need for the government to send a clear and unambiguous message against torture and ill-treatment could not be made clearer to me,” he said.
Attaboy.
“I received repeated and disturbingly frank admissions by senior police and military officials that torture was acceptable in some instances, and was indeed systematically practised,” he added.

A Royal Nepal Army spokesman, Brigadier General Dipak Gurung, denied the UN official’s charges. The army “has no such thing as systematic torture,” Gurung said. ”We have not tortured anyone.”
"Except a bunch of Maoists, and they ain't human, know what I mean?"
Nowak said methods of torture used by the army and police included “beating with bamboo poles and plastic pipes, kicking with boots, electric shocks to the ear and rolling rods over the thighs.”

“Other methods included being bound to a pole and hung upside and beaten, specially on the soles of the feet, prolonged periods of being blindfolded and handcuffed,” he said.

He said the army and police detained the suspected prisoners in narrow, cage-like cells where there was barely enough space to stand and sleep. He added he had also “received shocking evidence of torture and mutilation carried out by the Maoists in order to extort money, punish non-cooperation and intimidate others.”
But that's different, of course.
Posted by:Steve White

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