2 5. In Cantoral Benavides v. Peru (Judgment of August 18, 2000), when establishing a violation of Article 5 of the American Convention, the Inter-American Court considered that certain acts that, in the past, were classified as “inhuman or degrading treatment,” could, subsequently, with the passage of time, come to be considered torture, since the growing demand for protection must be accompanied by a prompt and more vigorous response in dealing with infractions of the basic values of democratic societies (para. 99). The ineluctable fight against torture – “a form of hell that has accompanied our civilization” – and other grave human rights violations represents, in the final analysis, the daily fight to “ensure that the principles of humanity prevail.” 2 6. The categorical and absolute prohibition of torture under any circumstance, which falls within the sphere of international jus cogens 3, is a definitive conquest of civilization. Indeed, the way in which the public authorities treat those who are detained is an infallible criterion for measuring the degree of civilization attained by any country (whether or not it is a party to the human rights treaties). This is what F.M. Dostoevsky had already observed in the nineteenth century, in Notes from the House of the Dead (1862) 4; he considered that the degree of civilization attained by any society could be assessed by visiting its prisons. 7. In actual fact, the definition of the crime of torture, which today is found in two of the three co-existing conventions against torture (article 1 of the 1984 United Nations Convention, and article 2 of the 1985 Inter-American Convention) owes its content to international human rights case law, and not to the classification of the crime of torture in domestic law. The elements that constitute torture in the definition found in the two conventions mentioned above – severe physical or mental suffering, inflicted intentionally, to obtain information or a confession, with the consent or acquiescence of the authorities or other persons acting in an official capacity – is a result of the case law of the former European Commission on Human Rights in the Greek case (1967-1970), elaborated subsequently by the European Commission and Court in Ireland v. United Kingdom (1971-1978) 5. 8. In this respect, international case law preceded and influenced international legislation in the sphere of the protection of human rights. Manifesting itself formally in the sphere of international human rights law through either case law or legislation, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of the United Nations and the American Convention on Human Rights, and is “generally recognized as an internationally accepted standard”; European Court of Human Rights, Soering v. United Kingdom, judgment of July 7, 1989, p. 26, para. 88. 2 A. Cassese, Inhuman States - Imprisonment, Detention and Torture in Europe Today, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1996, pp. 59-61. 3 Cf. M. Nowak and W. Suntinger, “International Mechanisms for the Prevention of Torture”, in A. Bloed et alii (eds.), Monitoring Human Rights in Europe - Comparing International Procedures and Mechanisms, Dordrecht, Nijhoff, 1993, pp. 145-168. 4 Cf. F. Dostoevsky, Souvenirs de la maison des morts, Paris, Gallimard, 1997 (re-edition), pp. 35- 416. 5 A.A. Cançado Trindade, Tratado de Direito Internacional dos Direitos Humanos, tomo II, Porto Alegre/Brazil, S.A. Fabris Ed., 1999, pp. 37-38.