A/HRC/13/42* page 125 political dissidents. Detainees were often held for several months without charge or access to a lawyer or their families. The locations in which NISS detainees were held sometimes remained unknown.474 267. Of particular concern for the purposes of the present study are the cases of the men detained in the aftermath of the attack on Omdurman in May 2008 by rebels belonging to the Darfurian Justice and Equality Movement. Following the attack, Government security forces rounded up hundreds of Darfurians in the capital, the majority of them civilians. In August 2008, it was reported that hundreds of these individuals were still held in undisclosed places of detention and denied all contact with the outside world. 268. The experts interviewed one of the above-mentioned individuals, X.W., who explained that, after being seized at his place of work, he was taken to the NISS Political Bureau of Security Services in Bahri, Khartoum, near the Shandi bus terminal, where he was held in incommunicado detention for nearly two months. Interrogated and tortured for five days, he was then moved from a corridor, where those being interrogated were held, to a large hall where about 200 detainees were held and where the lights were constantly on. Moved to Kober prison in July 2008, he continued to be held in incommunicado detention. X.W. was released in September 2008.475 269. While X.W. was at no stage brought before a judge or charged with any offence, many others were brought before special anti-terrorism courts, which imposed death sentences in more than 100 cases. In two communications to the Government of the Sudan, five special procedures mandate holders drew the Government’s attention to reliable reports, according to which: Following their apprehension, the defendants were held without access to the outside world for over one month and were not given access to lawyers until after the trial proceedings opened. Observers at the trials noticed that the defendants looked tired and appeared to be in pain. The defendants complained that they had been subjected to torture or ill-treatment, but the court did not investigate these allegations and refused to grant requests by the defendants’ lawyers for independent medical examinations. In reaching their verdicts, the courts relied as evidence primarily on confessions by the defendants, which the defendants said they were forced to make under torture and ill-treatment and which they retracted in court. The court made reference to the Sudanese Evidence Act, which permits the admission to judicial proceedings of statements obtained by unlawful means.476 474 A/HRC/11/14, para.32. 475 Interview with X.W. (annex II, case 21). 476 Urgent appeals of 11 August and 24 September 2008, sent by the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, arbitrary or summary executions, the Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights while countering terrorism, the Special Rapporteur on the situation on human rights in the Sudan and the Special Rapporteur on the question of torture, report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions (A/HRC/11/2/Add.1), p. 385.