A/HRC/13/39 Rights and present Human Rights Council, the United Nations has significantly enhanced the objectivity of the international human rights discourse. 24. Independent experts have played an increasingly active role within the human rights system of the United Nations since the late 1960s. They make up the human rights treaty bodies entrusted with the monitoring of States parties’ compliance with their respective treaty obligations. In parallel, on the basis of Economic and Social Council Resolution 1235 (XLII) of 1967, the former Commission on Human Rights entrusted working groups and later individual experts to investigate the overall human rights situation in those States particularly criticized for gross and systematic violations of human rights (country-specific mandates). The Special Rapporteur on Torture was established in 1985 as the third thematic mandate. 25. The tasks of the Special Rapporteur on the question of torture are manifold and, besides the key areas outlined below, include a variety of awareness-raising activities done, for example, via the media. 26. Despite the considerable constraints in terms of time and resources, the Special Rapporteur feels that he is able to provide a fairly comprehensive study of the phenomena of torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, including an assessment of conditions of detention, in the world today (contained in A/HRC/13/40/Add. 5). Although in total he has visited less than 10 per cent of all Member States, many problems found in the countries visited are similar and follow a certain pattern, which allows the Special Rapporteur to draw general conclusions. 27. The present report builds on the analysis contained in the study, which is primarily based on the experience gained during country visits. The Special Rapporteur would therefore like to thank all the Governments that had invited him to carry out fact-finding missions and facilitated them by providing information and support. Secondly, he is grateful to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Geneva for supporting his mandate most effectively and providing him with highly motivated and professional staff. Thirdly, without the effective support and cooperation of a considerable number of international and domestic NGOs, as well as courageous human rights defenders in many countries, it would have been impossible either to regularly send allegation letters and urgent appeals to Governments or carry out highly difficult and complex fact-finding missions in all regions. Fourthly, he wishes to thank the Governments of Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and other donors for their support of a remarkable team of highly professional and dedicated human rights experts at the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Human Rights at the University of Vienna. Lastly, he is impressed by the courage of so many victims and witnesses, both inside and outside detention, who provided him with information about prison conditions and detailed accounts of their own suffering at the hands of ruthless torturers and their superiors in too many countries. Many of these courageous individuals, despite the major concern that the protection that the Special Rapporteur — and the United Nations — could give is regrettably very limited, took the risk to provide him with the information necessary to carry out his mandate and inform the United Nations about the reality of torture and ill-treatment around the world. 28. The reality is alarming. Despite the fact that torture constitutes one of the most brutal attacks on human dignity and one of the most serious human rights crimes — and notwithstanding the absolute prohibition of torture and ill-treatment even in the most exceptional circumstances, such as war, internal disturbances and terrorism — torture and ill-treatment are widespread practices in the majority of the countries. No society is immune from torture, but, in many societies, torture is practised on a daily basis, both as a means to fight ordinary crime and in combating terrorism, extremism or similar politically motivated offences. In addition, conditions of detention are appalling in the vast majority of countries and must often be qualified as cruel, inhuman or degrading. Whether convicted 6 GE.10-10042