Geneva, 10 June 2021
This coming Sunday 13 June, the Swiss will vote on the Federal Act on Police Measures to Combat Terrorism (
Loi fédérale sur les mesures policières de lutte contre le terrorisme), which, if enacted, will allow the police to take preventive measures against “potential terrorists” without any meaningful judicial oversight. The designation as “potential terrorist” does not require the existence or prospect of any crime, a fact that could negatively impact the exercise of lawful and peaceful activities by civil society groups.
The World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) and the members of its global Torture and Terrorism Working Group are concerned over the serious risk of arbitrariness such reforms will entail and the human rights violations their implementation could bring about, including breaches of the right to liberty and security of the person. A neglected but important concern is that its penalties will likely be based on unreliable information, including in many instances from foreign secret services. We have seen time and again that torture is systematically used by intelligence agencies in many of the countries that are most likely to share information about possible threats.