A/HRC/40/CRP.1 welts and swelling all over my body. […] I ended up losing consciousness—I just felt off afterwards and could not recognize myself. Once I regained my senses, the pain was excruciating, and I could not sleep the entire night. Despite my pain, I was not offered immediate medical attention.428 While beatings and whipping are the most common forms of torture, witnesses also reported having toe nails removed, ears cut with scissors, incisions made with knives, razors and nails, and burning with plastic or wire. A few detainees reported being electrocuted at the NSS Blue House and Giada SPLA barracks. The security forces connected electrical wires to victims’ nipples, arms and legs. Afterwards, victims were unable to urinate, had blood in their urine, vomited blood, and/or were unable to walk. Detainees are also subjected to positional torture including being laid on their chests with legs tied to both hands behind their backs (arbatachar) or in front of them, the use of restraints on wrists and ankles even while confined in cells, and being suspended upside down. One witness described being hung and beaten by SPLA Military Intelligence officers: They started beating me and kicking me with fist, shoes or butts of the guns and some of them with sticks. After a while I was unconscious. They tied me from my legs and arms. After a while they hanged me by rope to a tree. I was beaten while I was hanged also. I don’t know how long I was hanged. After a while they released the rope then I felt down. They hanged and dropped me 6 times. In one of the fallings [m]y teeth cut my lips. They had beaten me with butts, sticks every part of my body was bleeding When they saw that I was almost dying they stopped beating me.429 Detainees were subjected to psychological torture through threats of torture, enforced disappearance and death. They also described seeing and hearing other detainees being tortured. One witness recalled “the three NSS officers were beating […] the guy while they were taking the statement. Everyone could hear his screams echoing throughout the building.”430 Although there are comparatively few women arrested or detained by the NSS or SPLA Military Intelligence, there have been a number of instances of mistreatment of women in custody.431 In one instance, “The NSS officers kept slapping the women’s buttocks and pulling their hair and wigs. They kept calling them prostitutes and asking them why they had joined SPLA-IO. The NSS officers forced them to remove their t-shirts as well, so they were standing there in their brassieres.”432 The Commission did not find information indicating widespread sexual abuse in security-related detention; however, it was told of individual incidents of sexual abuse, including forced nudity, attempted castration, needles stuck in a man’s penis, and the rape of a male prisoner. However, further investigation is required in this respect. The conditions in which detainees are held may also in some cases amount to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. In this regard, the Commission notes in particular the detention conditions described above of dirty, infested with vermin, overheated, overcrowded cells with little ventilation and in some cases no light, particularly for those held underground. These conditions are compounded by insufficient water and food. The Commission particularly notes the absence of toilet facilities or any kind of privacy leading to inhuman and degrading conditions. Furthermore, numerous detainees were held in solitary confinement at the NSS Blue House for extended periods of time, with some spending more than seven months in solitary confinement. The solitary confinement cells have even worse conditions than the conditions in the other larger cells. The tiny cells only measure about one metre by one and a half metres so detainees can barely move around. The doors to solitary confinement cells are only opened briefly once a day in the afternoon when detainees are fed and allowed to use the lone bathroom at the end of the hall to use the toilet and bathe. At other times of the day, detainees must use a plastic bottle in their cells to urinate. 428 Witness 950, ERN 101955-101979. Witness 951, ERN D116738-D116746. 430 Witness 1031, ERN 102184-102210, para. 57. 431 Confidential Document, ERN D116262-D116270. 432 Witness 912, ERN 102126-102140. 429 66