Commentary Places of interrogation which are not available for proper scrutiny can become instruments of oppression and places of torture and can lead to “disappearances”.37 Such disappearances can constitute torture or cruel inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment for relatives as well as the person involved.38 Secret places of detention should thus be abolished under law and it should be a punishable offence for any official to hold a person in a secret and/or unofficial place of detention.39 Relatives or a third person of an arrested person’s choice should always be notified at the time of any arrest, detention, imprisonment or transfer. Consular authorities of the State of origin of a detained foreigner should also be informed without delay of his or her arrest or detention or interrogation.40 3. Individuals should only be interrogated for a reasonable period, taking into account the individual characteristics of the interrogated person and, if extending for a lengthy period, regular breaks should be provided. 37 Please see the discussion of “Safehouses” in the Philippines in the book In Search of Balms – A Walk Forward to Healing (2005) Published by the Balay Rehabilitation Centre. 38 See Kurt v Turkey,judgment of the ECHR, 25 May 1998, where the ECHR held that the mother of a disappeared person was herself a victim of inhuman and degrading treatment. In Cakici v Tukey, judgment of the ECHR, 8 July 1999, the ECHR held that whether a family member of a ‘disappeared person’ is a victim of illtreatment will depend on the particular circumstances of the case. The ECHR explained that the focus is the authorities’ reactions and attitudes to the situation when it is brought to their attention (at para 98). 39 Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights ‘Question of enforced or involuntary disappearances’ 2003/38, 23 April 2003 at para 14; Report of the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, ‘Civil and Political Rights, including the questions of torture and detention’, Commission on Human Rights, Sixtieth session, E/CN.4/2004/56, 23 December 2003 at para 37. Further, acts of enforced disappearance are crimes against humanity as defined in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (A/CONF. 183/9) 40 Report of the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, ‘Civil and Political Rights, including the questions of torture and detention’, Commission on Human Rights, Sixtieth session, E/CN.4/2004/56, 23 December 2003 at [31]. See also Article 36(1) of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations; and Principle 16(2) of the Principles for Persons under Detention. 56