Unusual Treatment: Direct Provision and the Practice of Torture
Unusual Treatment: Direct Provision and the Practice of Torture
International law jurists have struggled to define torture. One of the earliest attempts to define it was in the 1500s, where it was described as an “infliction of severe bodily pain as a means of punishment or persuasion.”[1]
Then in 1612, Italian jurist Sebastian Guazzini defined torture “as the distress of body devised for extracting truth.”[2]
When populations thinks of torture, their mind often travels to the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba or some unknown top secret military site in the middle of nowhere.
But what if these acts—instead of occurring in some unknown black site across the world—are happening right in your own backyard?
Direct Provision was introduced by the Irish government as an emergency measure in 1999 to provide international protection applicants or asylum seekers with ‘…a range of State services, including food and accommodation.’ Its initial goal was to offer short-term accommodation for asylum seekers who were arriving in the country at the time. However, it has received averse publicity and has been a source of controversy over the years.
For instance, asylum seekers have mysteriously died in the institution, with the coroner’s office declaring the cause of death of these unknown. How are some of the most vulnerable persons, who have travelled miles over sea and land to achieve safety, dying in an institution that is supposed to protect them?
Reports continue to surface from tormented voices within direct provision that Officials are punishing individuals for seeking asylum in Ireland. It’s not quite like the Trump Administration—foil blanket for asylum seekers within detention centres punishment…it’s worse.
Testimony from the voices within Direct Provision, include but are not limited to, the alleged force feeding of asylum seekers, eviction of asylums seekers who complain about housing conditions, theft of an asylum seekers personal property by staff, and most surprisingly….torture.
One specific incident of torture is the use of high-technology noise. One of the earliest accounts of its use was in 1977, which was used on two Israeli prisoners who described the incident as strange noises that “disturbed their sleep.”[3] Although no reports of this kind of torture have been documented in decades, asylum seekers in Direct Provision are coming forward with claims of being subjected noises like those heard in the Frigidaire.
Although there have been marches in Ireland in recent weeks that over the presumption that asylum seekers are not being vetted, some argue the torture experienced in Direct Provision is being secretly used to vet particular asylum seekers or to forcibly repatriate them, and drive them out of Ireland.
Presently, the UN Declaration against Torture defines torture as “any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted by or at the instigation of a public official on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or confession, punishing him for an act he has committed, or intimidating him or other persons.”
But what does an individual do when (1) they have experienced persecution in their country of origin and cannot return, and (2) are being subjected to torture just for seeking asylum?
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References
[1] Humanterm. (n.d.). Torture. Universidad Europea. Available at: https://humantermuem.es/content/torture-en/?lang=en
[2] Rejali, D. M. (2009). Torture and democracy. Princeton University Press.
[3] Id.
