III. Human Rights Abuses against Migrants

If you pay money [to the police], you can do anything in our region. If you want, you can kill people ... I have seen dead bodies many times by the side of the road ... Our area is like a fighting zone ... when the police hear the sounds of gunshots, they will not come ... [later] the police will come ask what happened, and write down the information and then they go away, and that is all that happens.

—Saw Htoo, Burmese migrant worker who provided information to the Thai police, Mae Sot district, Tak province

Both documented and undocumented migrants in Thailand are vulnerable to arbitrary acts of violence, intimidation, and extortion from state authorities including police, military, and immigration officers as well as private individuals. These abuses include killings, beatings, sexual harassment and rape, forced labor, abductions and other forms of arbitrary detention, death threats and other forms of intimidation, and various types of extortion and theft.

Killings, Torture, and Physical Abuses against Migrants

When I saw this [killing], I felt that we Burmese people always have to be humble and have to be afraid of the Thai police. I feel that there is no security for our Burmese people [in Thailand] or for myself.[76]

—Su Su, Burmese migrant worker, August 24, 2008, Ranong province

Migrant workers and their families in Thailand are at particular risk of human rights violations by members of the security forces. Because of their precarious legal status, they also have far less effective avenues for redress in the event of killings, torture, and other ill-treatment in custody, or other abuses by the security forces. This fosters an environment of impunity and fear that exacerbates the tenuous circumstances in which migrants live.

In many cases, migrants have reported common crimes to the authorities only to have the police fail to conduct a genuine investigation, treat the matter with far less seriousness than they do comparable crimes committed against Thai nationals, or simply refuse to arrest alleged perpetrators despite detailed information from eyewitnesses. In other cases, migrants express grave fears that if they report a crime to the police, particularly when the police are involved, they themselves may be subject to retaliatory violence.

Killings by Security Forces

Su Su told Human Rights Watch that she witnessed the beating death of a Burmese migrant worker from Rangoon whom she estimated to be only 16 or 17 years old. She said he had traveled to the Thai port of Ranong to work on a fishing boat during a school break in order to earn his school fees. She told Human Rights Watch what happened near her home in early 2007:

He was coming out of the shop. There were two police officers on a motorcycle who stopped him and asked him if he had a work permit. But he could not speak Thai and so he did not reply....Those two police started to beat him and they kicked him in the chest until he died there. Many Burmese were watching and nobody went and helped because all of the people were afraid of those police, so nobody said anything about this killing, and nobody informed the police station. When the two police saw that the boy died, they went away on their motorcycle. I saw the next morning that the rescue foundation came and took the boy’s dead body and no police officer was with them ... I really wanted to help but I am afraid of those police.[77]

While violence against migrants is most prevalent among local police, a wide variety of police and paramilitary forces operate in Thailand, especially in the border areas. Often migrants cannot differentiate between them.

Maung Cho, a supervisor at a textile factory in Mae Sot close to the Thaungyinn River bordering Burma, told Human Rights Watch that “soldiers” were involved in the drowning death of his friend and co-worker, Ye Htun, on August 21, 2008. It is not clear whether these were Thai Army soldiers or members of another armed force under the Thai government but it is clear that they were present to try to break up a migrant worker rally.

As Maung Cho described the situation, a labor dispute had escalated when a factory manager called in soldiers from a nearby village checkpoint to deal with striking workers. The soldiers arrived armed with a shotgun and pistols. The workers outside the factory immediately fled, and soldiers fired in the air and yelled for them to stop—which produced the exact opposite effect. Many of the workers panicked and jumped into the swift-running Thaungyinn River to escape by swimming across the river to Burma. Maung Cho, who swam across the river, described Ye Htun’s death by drowning:

I turned around and could see Ye Htun struggling and he was trying to keep his face above the water ... He was maybe about 20 meters from the Thai side. There were about 10 workers who were already on the other river bank with me but we did not dare to go back and rescue him because the Thai soldiers were standing on the bank, looking at us, and pointing their guns at us. They were also walking back and forth on the riverbank near where Ye Htun was swimming and they pointed their guns at him. I could not hear what they were saying to him, but they were saying something—but it looked to me like they did not want him to come back to the Thai side.... Some of the workers who did not cross the river told me later that when Ye Htun’s head was going under water, one of the Thai soldiers said “Give him the bamboo,” meaning to use a piece of bamboo to help him. But the Thai soldiers did not help and by that time, Ye Htun’s head had gone underwater.

Maung Cho said Ye Htun’s body was never recovered. [78]

Torture and Ill-Treatment by Thai Authorities

Police torture of suspects in pre-trial detention in Thailand is well documented.[79] Migrant workers detained at police stations report similar practices, including frequent beatings and other forms of ill-treatment during pre-trial detention. The police use violence against detained migrants when they seek a confession of guilt or other information from a suspect or as a form of punishment, such as if a detainee looks directly at a police officer or fails to speak or comprehend Thai.

Sai Tao, from Burma, told Human Rights Watch that officers at the Saraphee district police station in Chiang Mai severely beat his brother Sai Aye after arresting him in December 2007 on suspicion of theft. A police officer called Sai Tao and told him to come to the police station to meet his brother. When Sai Tao arrived, the police immediately arrested and searched him, and confiscated his motorcycle.

During the initial questioning by police, Sai Tao said he stood close to his brother and was able to speak to him. His brother denied any involvement in theft and said the visible bruise behind his ear was from a beating inflicted by the police at the station. The police then took them both on a search of his brother’s room, but turned up no evidence of larceny.[80] Soon thereafter, Sai Tao was released, but his brother was held for further investigation. Sai Tao requested that the police call him when his brother was released so that he could pick him up.

Around 4 p.m. the next day, Sai Tao received a phone call from the police station saying they released his brother the previous night, but that he then stole something else, and while he was being chased, he fell off an apartment building. Sai Tao’s desperate search of hospitals led him to his brother at Maharaj Nakorn Hospital in the Suan Dok area. He was suffering severe head trauma and was unable to speak. His injuries required two operations and over 50 days of hospitalization. To this day Sao Tao’s brother remains severely disabled, unable to speak or walk by himself. Sai Tao believes the police were directly responsible:

I am sure that the police physically beat and abused my brother and made up the story of the apartment. I told them to call me if they released my brother and it makes no sense that they released him that same night after me.... My brother has never been involved in any criminal activity.... The story they told is just a lie, a cover story for what they did to my brother... I would like to take a case against the police, to hold them responsible....[81]

Aung Aung, a registered Burmese migrant worker, was traveling by train from Chiang Mai to Bangkok on the evening of August 2, 2009, when a railway policeman inspected his ID card and forced him to get off the train at the Lamphun province train station. When Aung Aung protested that his card was in order with the correct authorization and signatures, the railway policeman punched him in the face, and then repeatedly kicked Aung Aung until he collapsed on the ground.[82] The railway policeman and a colleague took Aung Aung back to the Chiang Mai railway police station, searched him, then “fined” him 1200 baht. On August 4, with support from MAP, Aung Aung filed a complaint against the police with the Chiang Mai provincial governor’s office. Since the case was filed, Aung Aung learned from neighbors in his old neighborhood in Sankampaeng district that the railway police have searched for him multiple times. Aung Aung now fears for his life and his case was taken up by the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand.[83]

Migrant workers who attempt to flee arrest are often beaten by the police. On August 5, 2008, Border Patrol Police (BPP) arrested Maung Kyi, an undocumented Burmese day laborer in Mae Sot, close to the village where he worked. According to Maung Kyi, he then jumped off the moving BPP pickup truck in an attempt to escape. Four BPP officers chased and caught him, repeatedly kicked him, and beat him severely on his legs with their batons. They dragged him back to the truck and another BPP officer kicked him in the chest, making it hard, Maung Kyi said, for him to breathe. The BPP released him part way between Mae Sot and his village, but he could not work for days because of his injuries. Twenty days later he still had bruises and scars from the beating he suffered.[84]

Oem Borey, a fisherman from Cambodia, told Human Rights Watch how his physical altercation with a Thai fishing boat captain resulted in his being further severely ill-treated by Thai police. Oem Borey described a fight that he had on board a boat in the Gulf of Thailand off the coast of Trad province on August 25, 2008. He says the captain accused him of disobedience, hit him with a metal pipe, and, when he fought back, the captain radioed other boat captains for assistance, who then arrived and beat him severely. When the boat returned to dock at Klong Makam in Trad province, the captain called the police and told them Oem Borey was drunk and had tried to steal the boat. Police from the nearby Klong Yai district station arrived, and Oem Borey says police beat him at the pier at least four more times on the back using their wooden batons until he lost consciousness.[85]

Oem Borey suffered a deep gash on the head, a broken nose, possible broken ribs, and other injuries, but he said the Klong Yai police refused to send him to the hospital. Instead, they held him without medical treatment in the police station lock-up for 13 days.[86] Oem Borey reported that during his detention, the police interrogated him once and accused him of attempting to steal the fishing boat. He said he was too scared to respond so he said nothing. The following day, the police forced him to fingerprint a Thai language document that he could not read. He received no explanation from the police about the content or purpose of the document. His sister negotiated a 2000 baht payment to the police for his release, plus an additional 300 baht to compensate the police for agreeing to help him find a new job.

Thailand’s ratification of the Convention against Torture in October 2007 has not resulted in more energetic efforts to combat torture and ill-treatment or to revise Thailand’s laws to conform to the requirements of the treaty. [87] And although the Thai Constitution of 2007 prohibits torture,[88] Thailand lacks a specific law on torture, which complicates efforts by migrants (and advocates for migrants) who undertake to raise a complaint of torture against a government official.[89]

Police Abuses: An Insider’s Account

Saw Htoo is an ethnic Karen migrant worker who worked closely for some 10 years as a member of a gang led by a police sergeant[90] in the area of Kilometer 48 village in Pop Phra district, Mae Sot province. Originally self-employed, Saw Htoo became vulnerable when police confiscated his legitimate passport in 2003, claiming it was fake. With no documentation, and as his overseas business partners had left the area, he progressively fell into working for the police sergeant. His duties as a gang member included providing information, collecting money from enterprises for the gang leader, and acting on the orders of the sergeant, who employs gang members to intimidate and extort migrant workers. In exchange, senior gang members like Saw Htoo had the opportunity to run profitable enterprises—in his case, operating an illegal lottery and managing the beer and wine shop at the sergeant’s compound and snooker hall—and receiving a percentage of the proceeds. Gang members frequently serve as intermediaries between migrants and police, negotiating payments for release of migrants from detention.

Saw Htoo performed all these functions and more. By his own admission, he physically beat migrants, served as a middleman for police to extort money from migrant families, and joined raids to detain migrant workers who were then brought to the police sergeant’s compound for interrogation. While he claims not to have killed anyone or witnessed any killings, he believes that they occur.

Gang membership offers police protection for some migrants and their families, power within the migrant community, and impunity for illegal acts and abuses. Saw Htoo said:

Many migrants in this area want to become [sergeant’s name withheld] luk nong [follower or employee] because this would make them free from being arrested because he will protect them. Also, when there are fights between the migrants, it is the police luk nong that have the upper hand and everyone is scared of them.[91]

However, with membership come dangers if a migrant gang member knows too much about his boss’ business, or if he crosses the boss. In May 2009, the police sergeant repeatedly beat Saw Htoo in different public locations in the Kilometer 48 area and conducted a mock execution.[92] Saw Htoo is now in hiding on the Thai-Burma border.

As a gang member, Saw Htoo said he saw and in some cases participated in police abuses against migrants, including beatings and torture while in detention, rape, sexual harassment, forced labor, and systematic looting of migrant workers’ money and valuables.

Saw Htoo said that the police in the area physically abused migrants on a regular basis. Interrogations at the house of the police sergeant heading the gang and the police post at 48 Kilometer village routinely included slapping, punching, and kicking the suspects. Saw Htoo said:

I saw it so many times when the migrants were arrested, they would be beaten by the police at the police station. Usually the arrested migrants didn’t understand what the policeman was saying because they did not speak good Thai—and so the policeman would kick the migrants.... I saw often the police use their hands to slap the faces of the migrants.... If any migrant looks up at the police while they are being beaten, that’s it—they will definitely be hit again.

The area is also a major transit route for workers moving from Burma into Thailand. Saw Htoo said that the police sergeant and his gang members detained and beat migrants and their guides who allegedly had not paid police bribes to transit the area. Beatings of migrants occurred at the sergeant’s compound[93] every two or three days. Saw Htoo recounted the severe beating that he, the sergeant, and two other gang members inflicted on three migrant workers in April 2009.

Saw Htoo believes the primary reason for these beatings is to force migrants to pay money to gain their release, “Really, he [the police sergeant] is just interested in extorting money from the migrants and he knows he can do this by catching them and beating them.”

Saw Htoo said he regularly saw migrant women coerced to sleep with police officers outside the station in exchange for their freedom, and spoke to women who had been raped in 48 kilometer police post. He stated that “If there is a young, good-looking woman, especially if the police think that she might be a virgin, she will be taken to sleep with the police.” Over the course of 10 years working with police at Kilometer 48, he said he knew of more than 20 instances during which migrant women were raped by police in a back room in the police post. He said, “I am the one who the relatives will send with the money to get the woman out of jail.... After they are released, those women are crying and telling me the story of what happened to them. Usually, the girls will be raped in the police station. In the 48 Kilometer police station, there is a small, narrow room with a bed that is used for this. They are just taking the girls out of the lock-up, and raping them in that room.”

Saw Htoo said that often the women are released after the police rape them, but in other instances, the policeman will pressure the woman to become his mistress.

Saw Htoo said police regularly steal valuables from migrant workers if they find them, and extort money from migrants and their families to release arrested migrants. He said, “I have seen police take money, and they also like to steal gold necklaces and other gold jewelry.... If a migrant worker does not have a migrant worker ID, the police will sometimes take that person’s mobile phone too.” Saw Htoo said he played the role of an intermediary between police and the families of arrested migrants. Police compelled migrants to call their relatives or friends to bring money for their release, and the families used Saw Htoo to serve as a negotiator because they were too afraid to talk directly with the police. He said:

At the police station, the police demand 3000, 4000, or even 5000 baht from each of the migrants.... If police ask for 3000 baht and the family of the migrant cannot afford that, they might propose to pay 2000 baht instead, and I have to help with this bargaining. If the money is paid, then the migrant will be let go.

Saw Htoo also described the use of forced labor over the course of approximately 20 days in March 2009. Each day the police sergeant arbitrarily apprehended Burmese migrants and forced them to dig a fish pond in his compound. Saw Htoo witnessed the sergeant accosting three migrants walking past the compound on their way to market, threatening them, and forcing a man to work for the day. He said the sergeant told the man’s wife, “You can go now and do what you want, come back at 5 p.m. and I will release him then.” He did not pay the man for his day’s work.

Saw Htoo’s detailed accounts shed light from an “insider’s” perspective on what migrant workers from Burma, Cambodia, and Laos have told Human Rights Watch about abusive treatment they receive from corrupt police in places in other areas of Thailand, and the impunity with which police are able to take advantage of migrants.[94]

Failure to Investigate Crimes against Migrants

The Thai police often fail to actively investigate ordinary crimes as well as human rights violations by the authorities against migrants. Migrants’ lack of trust in police is underscored by the frequent number of instances in which Thai’s who have committed beatings or other physical abuses against migrants have then called the police to arrest and detain the migrant.

This was evident in the case of Aye Aye Ma, a registered migrant worker from Burma, and her husband, Cho, in Phang Nga. According to Aye Aye Ma, around 3 a.m. on November 5, 2007, two men armed with hunting rifles, wearing masks and head flashlights[95] appeared where they were working in a rubber plantation and demanded money. Aye Aye Ma told Human Rights Watch:

My husband looked at me. Then that man who was talking shot my husband in the head, and I saw him fall ... I couldn’t believe it, I was shocked.... I started crying and yelled to my husband but I was also so afraid that I could not run to my husband ... And then those two men came over and grabbed me, and they ripped off my clothes. I think that they killed my husband because they wanted to rape me ... I kept yelling “Please don’t kill me! Please don’t kill me!” ... The whole rape took maybe 10 minutes, one raped me and then the other raped me. When they were finished raping me, they just walked away like nothing happened. They also stole our head flashlights and the rubber tree tapping knives from me and my husband.[96]

After the assailants left, Aye Aye Ma called friends for assistance, and they in turn contacted the Thai Muang district police and the Migrant Assistance Program (MAP). The police came to the crime scene, took photographs, and collected two used condoms with semen inside as evidence, and later interviewed Aye Aye Ma at the police station. A commanding officer, police Lt. Col. Kittichet Kittiratanasombat, ordered in the investigation report dated November 9, 2007, that a DNA test should be performed on the semen,[97] in line with standard police procedure that such tests should be done within three days of the collection of the evidence. But when MAP staff later went to inquire about the test, officers at the police station said the test had not been carried out because of budgetary constraints.[98] No results of any DNA test were ever shared by the police, who later admitted to MAP that one division in the police ordered the DNA test but then never provided any further information about the test to the police actually in charge of the investigation. At an interview at Thai Muang district two weeks after the crime, police showed two grainy photocopies of photographs in a police file to Aye Aye Ma, but she could not identify them because the men had worn masks and it was dark. As a result, the police investigators told MAP representatives that after one year they decided to suspend the case until new evidence is found.[99]

Besides the real possibility that police did not conduct a DNA test as ordered by their superior officer, Thai Muang police apparently did not pursue a suspect whose name and address were in the police report as one of the probable perpetrators.[100] Aye Aye Ma believes the police know who the perpetrators are because they may be individuals who have been implicated in the area for serious crimes in the past. For instance, her employer, a former sub-district chief, after hearing Aye Aye Ma’s description of the assailants, told her that those responsible could have been two men from a nearby village suspected in previous similar offenses.

Said Aye Aye Ma:

If the police really want to arrest the men that did it [murder], then they can do it. But they do not want to do it.... I am Burmese and a migrant worker that is why the police don’t care about this case ... I feel very bad about all of this, that the police have done nothing for me.... Really they know that I can’t do anything.... My husband and I are only migrant workers and we have no rights here.[101]

Since the last interview with the police two weeks after the murder and rape, police investigators have not contacted Aye Aye Ma or representatives of MAP, who accompanied her to file her case and who she designated as her official representatives. A follow-up letter from MAP to the police commander of Thai Muang district station did not receive a reply.[102]

U Win, from Burma, told Human Rights Watch that he and his co-workers witnessed the murder of his friend Thwar Sin in a vegetable field in Donsak district, Surat Thani province, on December 11, 2007, and that the police did not investigate the crime. For reasons they do not know (they were aware of no prior provocation), their Thai employer’s nephew hit Thwar Sin in the left shoulder and then in the head with a long-handled scythe. His fellow workers rushed Thwar Sin to Donsak Hospital, and then Surat Thani Provincial Hospital, where he died of his injuries. While U Win and several migrant workers were at the hospital, the local village headman and two policemen arrived and informed them the employer’s nephew was under arrest. However, on December 13, Thai villagers in the area told U Win that the police had released the assailant without filing any charges. No police officer ever contacted U Win or any of the other Burmese workers in the field who witnessed the attack, or the family of Thwar Sin, to investigate the murder. U Win said that without a sympathetic Thai to accompany them, they were too afraid to file a complaint with the police. He and the other migrant workers hoped that their employer would take responsibility, but the man did not take any action against his nephew. No compensation was paid to Thwar Sin’s wife, who was living in Thailand and pregnant at the time, and caring for her four-year-old son. U Win said:

I have no experience in filing a complaint with the police and I can face problems with the police if I do that. We are Burmese staying in Thailand. We should not go to the Thai police station—really, we do not believe that they will do anything for us ... We, in our conscience, wanted Thai authorities to take care of this case correctly. Though we come and work here as alien workers, we want to be treated with equally and justice before law. This is normal when Burmese workers are killed. The Thais never take any action and most of the cases disappear like this.[103]

Myo Myo, a Burmese migrant, told Human Rights Watch that she witnessed the killing of a newly arrived Burmese migrant worker in November 2007 by a Thai shop owner in Paknam sub-district in the Muang district of Ranong. She saw a dispute erupt between the shop owner and the Burmese man. The shop owner hit the Burmese man with a large piece of wood on his back and head, and he collapsed and died. His body lay on the ground for several hours until one of the Thai rescue foundations[104] retrieved the corpse. Myo Myo said that the police never came to investigate the killing. No one in the Burmese community reported the incident to the police because they were worried about having problems with the shop owner, who she believes has influence with the local police. She told Human Rights Watch:

Many Burmese saw this incident but nobody dared to say anything ... or inform the police. All of the Burmese people are afraid of him [the shop owner]. Sometimes I see the police come and talk to him and visit him, so I think he might work together with police. I have seen the police eat with him several times, and sometimes they drink beer in his shop. Sometimes there are two or three police who come and drink with him and their police car is parked right out front.[105]

Van Bourey, a Cambodian in Trad, told Human Rights Watch that on September 13, 2008, after he had a dispute with another Cambodian migrant, two local Thai motorcycle-taxi drivers who he knew by their nicknames severely beat him. One accosted and struck him four times with a heavy piece of wood, causing severe injuries to his left arm, side, and head. This assailant then left the scene, leaving the second man to guard the injured Van Bourey until police from the local Klong Jak police post arrived, which was approximately 15 minutes later. The attack took place in front of numerous people at Van Bourey’s dormitory, but Van Bourey did not see the police question any potential eyewitnesses, even after he immediately told the police the assailant’s name. Van Bourey said that instead the police handcuffed him behind his back, causing excruciating pain in his injured arm, and took him to the Klong Yai district hospital. The doctor’s examination found he had suffered a bruised skull. The next day, doctors agreed to release him and he left before the police returned. Inquiries to Klong Jak police by a local NGO found that the police intended to arrest Van Bourey on an immigration offense following his release from the hospital.[106]

Van Bourey told Human Rights Watch why he did not file a case against the assailant:

Even though I think that I could win the case, I am not brave enough to raise a complaint against [name withheld] because I am scared to have a problem with him. He knows a lot of people, including police, and I am worried that if I have a problem with him he could accuse me of doing something else, and I could be arrested at any time because I do not have an ID card.... They could accuse me of whatever else they wanted and I could not defend myself...

Most of the time when Thais beat Cambodians the Thais will later call the Thai police to arrest us. The Thais know that most Cambodians here do not have migrant ID cards and they also know that we will not be brave enough to call the Thai police to catch them for beating us ... So it is like the Thais can beat us for free.[107]

This broader impunity for mistreatment of migrants manifests itself in physical abuse by Thais in connection with workplace disputes. Invariably the migrant workers are reluctant to bring such abuse to the attention of the authorities for fear of further mistreatment.

U Ko Nai, an experienced Burmese construction supervisor and leader of Burmese workers, told Human Rights Watch that a Thai supervisor beat him so severely on April 4, 2008, that he lost consciousness.[108] Ko Shwe, a Burmese migrant worker, said that on August 26, 2008, at the food and drink shop where he worked in Surat Thani, a Thai worker punched him three times in the face, then knocked him to the floor and choked him. But when Ko Shwe went to the Muang district police station, he was met with indifference by police investigators. After checking Ko Shwe’s migrant ID card, the policeman told him that he “must bring the Thai man who beat you to the police station, or you need to bring his ID, or his photo to the police station.”[109] Ko Shwe told Human Rights Watch:

How can I take a Thai to the police station? It is impossible. The policeman just listened to me, he did not write anything down. I think that the police did not want to take any sort of serious action in my case.... I have the ID issued by the Thai government, but it is worthless—we [migrants] are afraid of everybody.[110]

Common criminals frequently target migrant workers for robbery and other offenses because it is common knowledge that migrants are less likely to approach police to file criminal complaints and insist on an effective police investigation. Hun Pee, a Cambodian food vendor in Muang district, Rayong, recalled the early morning attack she faced in July 2007. Her assailants stole 8000 baht and her gold ring before racing away on their motorcycle. Despite being in Thailand legally, she said she did not dare file a complaint with the police because of her concerns about the criminals, who might retaliate against her, and the police, whom she did not trust either to protect her or apprehend those responsible.[111]

Under international law, states have a positive obligation to prevent, investigate, and appropriately prosecute violations of human rights by state authorities and their agents, but also acts by private individuals harming the rights of others. According to the UN Human Rights Committee, the expert body that monitors compliance with the ICCPR, states must ensure that:

Individuals are protected by the State, not just against violations of Covenant rights by its agents, but also against acts committed by private persons or entities that would impair the enjoyment of Covenant rights in so far as they are amenable to application between private persons or entities. There may be circumstances in which a failure to ensure Covenant rights ... would give rise to violations by States Parties of those rights, as a result of States Parties’ permitting or failing to take appropriate measures or to exercise due diligence to prevent, punish, investigate or redress the harm caused by such acts by private persons or entities. ... [For example] States Parties have to take positive measures to ensure that private persons or entities do not inflict torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment on others within their power.[112]