Briefing
Detention Monitoring Tool: Instruments of restraint
While they may sometime be a necessary measure to provide security and order in a custodial setting (eg to prevent inter-prisoner violence or escape), instruments of restraint pose a high risk for torture or other ill-treatment due to their highly intrusive nature and the risk of causing injury, pain and/or humiliation. They may even be used as a torture tool.
This Factsheet:
- lists the relevant international standards
- identifies types and situations of risk (eg lack of regulation, use of prohibited instruments, including deliberately for torture, and lack of training)
- provides checklists of questions that monitoring bodies can ask for each risk factor
- suggests what monitoring bodies can do.
The Factsheet is part of PRI/APT’s Detention Monitoring Tool, which aims to provide analysis and practical guidance to help monitoring bodies, including National Preventive Mechanisms, to fulfil their preventive mandate as effectively as possible when visiting police facilities or prisons. The Tool seeks to support such bodies in addressing systemic risk factors that contribute to an environment where torture or other ill-treatment occurs.
Promote our resources
If you download a resource, please link to it from your website or share with your professional network.
Please contact us if you have any questions about our resources.