Detailed Recommendations NCHR presents the following recommendations for preventing torture and improving the overall human rights situation at the facility: 1. Legislate and criminalize torture The Government has passed yet another Torture, Custodial Death & Custodial Rape Bill in the National Assembly, however it has yet to be passed by the Senate and is currently being debated in the Standing Committee on Interior. Despite, Pakistan’s assurances in both its election to the UN Human Rights Council and in its acquisition of the GSP+ status, the government has failed to criminalize torture. According to the Human Rights Report on torture in Pakistan, “the first step to ending Pakistan’s endemic torture problem is to criminalize it. Justice and accountability in cases of torture will only be possible if parliament passes the torture bill and the government enforces the law by carrying out transparent and impartial investigations into torture allegations.” As it stands today, there is no mention of torture under Pakistan’s two primary criminal codes: the Pakistan Penal Code 1860 (PPC) and the Code of Criminal Procedure 1898 (CrPC). The Penal Code stipulates penalties for certain acts of torture under related offences such as “causing hurt to extort confession or to compel restoration of property”, “wrongful confinement to extort confession or compel restoration of property” or provisions governing “criminal force and assault.” These offences, however, do not encompass all the components of torture as outlined under Article 1 of the UNCAT. Furthermore, the term “hurt” under section 337-K of the Penal Code is legally ambiguous and it is uncertain whether or not it encompasses both physical and mental suffering. The UN Committee Against Torture stated in General Comment 2 that UNCAT requires that the offence of torture is named and defined as distinct from ‘common assault’ in order to alert victims, perpetrators and the general public of the special gravity of torture. Article 156(d) of the Police Order 2002 provides penalties against any police officer who inflicts “violence or torture” upon any person in his custody. However, the statute only penalizes acts by police officers and does not extend to other public officials and contains no definition of torture. It fails to distinguish torture as an offence distinct 15