By\u00a0Thalif Deen<\/p>\n\n\n\n
UNITED NATIONS (IPS)\u00a0<\/strong>– Jeanne Kirkpatrick, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, once made a highly debatable distinction between \u201cfriendly\u201d right-wing \u201cauthoritarian\u201d regimes (which were mostly U.S. and Western allies) and \u201cunfriendly\u201d left-wing \u201ctotalitarian\u201d dictatorships (which the U.S. abhorred).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Around the same time, successive U.S. administrations were cozying up to a rash of authoritarian regimes, mostly in the Middle East, widely accused of instituting emergency laws, detaining dissidents, cracking down on the press, torturing political prisoners and rigorously imposing death penalties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kirkpatrick\u2019s distinction between user-friendly right-wing regimes and unfriendly left-wing dictators prompted a sarcastic response from her ideological foe at that time, former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance, who shot back: \u201cIt seems to me that if you\u2019re on the rack (and being tortured), it doesn\u2019t make any difference if your torturer is right-handed or left-handed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last month, the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Alice Jill Edwards, warned that rigorous oversight of security and policing trade fairs is necessary to prevent prohibited and inherently abusive law enforcement equipment hitting the market after such items were found on display at Milipol 2025, an arms and security trade fair held in Paris from 18 to 21 November.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cDirect-contact electric shock devices, multiple kinetic impact projectiles and multi-barrel launchers cause unnecessary suffering and ought to be banned,\u201d Edwards said. \u201cTheir trade and promotion should be prohibited across all 27 EU Member States and globally.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Under the EU Anti-Torture Regulation \u2013 first introduced in 2006 and strengthened in 2019 \u2013 companies are banned from promoting, displaying or trading certain equipment that can be used for torture or ill-treatment. In 2025, the EU further expanded the list of prohibited and controlled law enforcement items, according to a UN press release.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dr. Simon Adams, President and CEO of the Center for Victims of Torture (CVT), the largest international organization that treats survivors and advocates for an end to torture worldwide, told IPS as the largest torture rehabilitation organization in the world, the Center for Victims of Torture supports the Special Rapporteur and the campaign to stop companies marketing, promoting and selling goods that are designed solely to inflict human suffering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Torture is a crime under international law and is illegal everywhere and at all times. Companies should not be able to market and trade goods that are routinely abused by security forces to commit human rights violations, or have no purpose other than to inflict torture, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAt CVT we work with traumatized survivors of torture every day. Many are refugees who have come from countries where security forces use the sort of devices that were on sale at the fair. The European Union has been a key partner in the campaign to establish torture-free trade.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt is unconscionable that companies are allowed to promote these products inside the EU. It is grotesque that such products even exist. This trade in human cruelty should be completely banned,\u201d declared Adams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n