Raimundo Moreira, 28, displays scars allegedly from two days of beatings and torture by Indonesian special forces in 1999. EPA/EMPICS
Just what does the language of torture really mean?
Environmental manipulation
Subjecting prisoners to extremes of hot and cold.
Forced grooming
Forcible shaving. Deeply humiliating for some Muslims.
Manipulative self-injurious behaviour
The US government’s description of 21 attempted suicides at Guantanamo Bay.
Pride and ego down
Label for techniques used to undermine prisoners’ self-esteem and dignity.
Rendition
Kidnapping terrorist suspects and delivering them to a foreign country for trial. In ‘extraordinary rendition’, suspects are ‘lent’ to a foreign country for interrogation and torture.
R2I
Resistance to interrogation: a training system used by British
special forces, in which subjects are stripped naked and sexually
humiliated.
Rumsfeld processing
Colloquial term for removing prisoners from army camps and holding them
in CIA facilities, which the Red Cross is not permitted to visit.
Sensory deprivation
Depriving prisoners of both sight and hearing, for example, by hooding
combined with white noise.
Sleep adjustment
Repeatedly interrupting a prisoner’s sleep, while allowing them adequate sleep overall.
Stress position
Position which a prisoner is ordered to maintain, causing discomfort or pain without physical contact.
Unlawful combatants
US definition of Al Qaeda and Taliban prisoners; as such, they are said
to be unprotected by the Geneva Conventions.
The Vietnam
Treatment in which electrodes (real or fake) are attached to the victim's body.
Waterboarding
CIA treatment in which the victim is smothered with a wet cloth, creating the sensation of drowning.
