13 names to avoid identification, (iv) division of roles among the assailants, with some carrying out the arrest and others in charge of the interrogation and torture, and (v) the assailants were frequently under the 33 influence of alcohol or drugs. 71. The CVR reported that police torture followed a pattern consisting of: (i) physically weakening the victims, forcing them to remain standing or in uncomfortable positions for several hours; (ii) covering their sight, making them lose their sense of place and time; (iii) insults and threats against the 34 victims, their families, or other people close to them, and (iv) forced nakedness. According to the CVR, the most common forms of physical torture at the police facilities were punching and blows with blunt instruments to the abdomen, face, and genitals; plunging the victim into a tank filled with a mixture of water, chemicals, excrement, and urine; making victims hang with their arms above their heads or behind 35 their backs for lengthy periods; and electric shocks to sensitive parts of the body. 72. The CVR explained that one of the main objectives of the torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment used in the counterinsurgency effort was to “extract information from people detained on suspicion of belonging to a subversive organization, either to plan operations against the organization or to secure information for criminal proceedings in the form of self-incriminatory statements 36 or accusations against others.” Several of the CVR’s informants claimed they had been tortured by police officers and forced to sign blank sheets of paper or self-incriminatory statements in the presence of 37 representatives of the Public Prosecution Service, who did nothing to intervene. 73. The CVR noted that during the Fujimori administration, the Public Prosecution Service deferred completely to the executive branch, and that public prosecutors refrained from making charges against members of the police and military, conducting forensic examinations, or investigating state 38 agents involved in human rights violations. 74. The organization Human Rights Watch said that this situation of impunity was due to a range of factors, including: (i) obstruction by officials of the military justice system in complaints against police officers, (ii) the fragility of judicial independence after April 1992, with increased numbers of temporary judges and prosecutors subject to pressure from the executive branch, and (iii) the enactment of the amnesty laws (Nos. 26479 and 26492), which voided all investigations and criminal prosecutions 39 against members of the police or armed forces for actions between May 1980 and June 1995. 2. The antiterrorist legislation adopted in 1992 and thereafter, and its impact on the institutionalization of torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment 75. On April 5, 1992, President of the Republic Alberto Fujimori Fujimori announced a series of measures intended to “streamline the process of […] national reconstruction,” “modernize the public 33 Final Report of the CVR, 2003, Vol. VI, 1.4 Torture and Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment, pp. 239 to 241, available at: www.cverdad.org.pe/ifinal/index.php. 34 Final Report of the CVR, 2003, Vol. VI, 1.4 Torture and Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment, pp. 242 and 243, available at: www.cverdad.org.pe/ifinal/index.php. 35 Final Report of the CVR, 2003, Vol. VI, 1.4 Torture and Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment, pp. 244 and 245, available at: www.cverdad.org.pe/ifinal/index.php. Similarly, see: Human Rights Watch, Peru: The Two Faces of Justice, July 1, 1995, Prosecution of Terrorism and Treason Cases, Interrogation and Torture, available at: www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/3ae6a7ed4.html. 36 Final Report of the CVR, 2003, Vol. VI, 1.4 Torture and Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment, p. 214, available at: www.cverdad.org.pe/ifinal/index.php. 37 Final Report of the CVR, 2003, Vol. VI, 1.4 Torture and Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment, pp. 224, 251, and 252, available at: www.cverdad.org.pe/ifinal/index.php. 38 39 Final Report of the CVR, 2003, Vol. III, 2.6 The Judiciary, p. 283, available at www.cverdad.org.pe/ifinal/index.php. Human Rights Watch, Torture and Political Persecution in Peru, December 1997, Section III, The Institutional Context: Weakened Safeguards against Torture – Military Justice, and Section V, Court Cases, available at: www.hrw.org/legacy/spanish/informes/1997/peru.html.