Amnesty International’s new report “Agents of Fear: The National Security Service in Sudan” includes a number of detailed stories of those who have survived NISS torture. The human rights organizations cites NISS documents that reveal many brutal torture methods used by NISS, such as: electric shocks, severe beatings and whipping, the denial of restroom facilities, sexual abuse, and many other types of abusive and inhumane treatment. In addition, the NISS for years has been taking their victims to “ghost houses” in and around Khartoum and torturing them in these unofficial, undisclosed locations.

The following is a passage from the report on the section on torture:

“NISS agents use psychological torture as much as physical torture. This is demonstrated by the environment they create during interrogations, the vocabulary they use, as well as some of the methods they rely on to weaken the mental state of their victims and make them more vulnerable and hence more willing to “confess”. The scene of an interrogation was described by many survivors of torture as a stage on which NISS agents perform different roles and where the victim is made to go through various stages of psychological suffering, leading sometimes to a “confession”.

Abdelshakour was moved back and forth between the electric shock room and the hot room until 5 that evening. At 5pm he was taken to another place and made to sit against a wall until 10 pm. At 10 pm, he was taken for another interrogation. Abdelshakour Hashim Dirar was released from NISS detention on 3 September 2008. He now lives in exile.”

Survivors of torture often link a certain feeling, smell or sound to their   memory of torture. One Chadian survivor of torture at the hands of the NISS told Amnesty International that during his detention in Darfur, NISS agents used to play music every time they tortured them. They, the detainees, found it strange because the house in which they were kept was remote and it was unlikely that anyone could hear their screams. “When I asked some people about it after my release, someone told me the reason they did it was to make us relive our torture every time we heard music playing…

At noon the same day, he was taken to the top of the building and exposed to the sun for an hour with his hands tied behind his back. He was then thrown into a room with a hot air conditioning system and no windows. He said that the heat was intolerable and no human being could survive long in it. He was kept there for a few hours, enough to cause damage to his skin. He was then taken out and moved into another room where NISS agents administered electric shocks through his hands and feet. He received eight shocks initially.

“Abdelshakour Hashim Dirar is a lawyer, a member of the Darfur Bar Association, and brother-in-law of Suleiman Sandal Hajjar, a JEM commander. On 14 May 2008, he was arrested from his office in Omdurman by NISS agents in uniform. Around 30 armed men arrived in three vehicles. Ten of them dragged him from his office, blindfolded him and threw him into one of the vehicles. Abdelshakour was held for four months and described being tortured on a regular basis. He said he was held in solitary confinement for long periods, and the door of his cell would open at night and security agents would enter and whip him repeatedly.

Abdelshakour described various methods of torture he suffered in the space of one day:On 17 May 2008, the day after an interrogation in which he denied having any links with the JEM, NISS agents arrived and started beating him. The beating continued for two hours; seven NISS agents were involved, five in uniform and two in plain clothes. They used their bare hands, kicked him and hit him with plastic water pipes.

On the first day of his arrest, Abdelshakour spent almost five hours blindfolded up against a wall and was then taken for interrogation. The NISS agents asked him some questions, then forced him to take off his clothes. That is when the beating started. He was beaten with plastic water pipes and electrical wires. The torture lasted until around 5am the next morning. Abdelshakour fainted three times and was dragged to the bathroom, had water thrown on him to wake him up, and the torture resumed.

Abdelshakour was interviewed by a number of different people during his detention. All questioned him about the JEM’s plans and about traitors within the Sudanese Armed Forces. Every time he repeated that he knew nothing about the JEM he was tortured again.