From No Trace Project

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Preface

Torture — the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering for punishment, interrogation or intimidation — is one of the tools used by the State and its allies in their war against anarchists. What individual and collective strategies can anarchists implement to prepare for, resist, and fight back against torture? This collection of texts aims to help answer this question by sharing the experiences and insights of anarchists, communists, and other militants who have been confronted with torture in the past five decades.

Torture is one of the toughest challenges that our movements can face. How to prepare for the risk of torture? How to organize so that if a comrade is captured, tortured, and talks, the risks to other comrades and to our activities are minimized? Should we commit to not talk under torture? How to not talk when faced with the most brutal physical and psychological treatments? How to deal with comrades who have talked under torture? How to fight back against torturers? How to help survivors of torture manage their pain and traumas?

We have strived to select texts that can help comrades answer these questions here and now, without relying on the enforcement of international laws or the lobbying of humanitarian NGOs. Each text is preceded by a short introduction in which we present the author and the original context of publication. Some of the texts include explicit descriptions of acts of torture.

We would like to express our gratitude to the authors of the texts, as well as to the translators who made their inclusion in this collection possible.

No Trace Project