Torture is so odious a form of outrage in relation to the individual as to be inconceivable except in connection with (alleged) claims of the community, e.g. in the case of judicial torture, to which resort is had in order to prove or to prevent crime. Judicial torture is a form of penal proceedings. It is open to question both on ethical grounds and in regard to its efficacity.

From 17 July to 8 August 1971, Mr. Marcel A. Naville, President of the ICRC, accompanied by Mr. Georg Hoffmann, ICRC Delegate-General for Africa, went to Ethiopia, Kenya, Senegal and Cameroon. The purpose of the trip was, on the one hand, to contact government authorities and Red Cross leaders in each country and, on the other, to visit the two ICRC regional delegations set up a year ago in Yaoundé and Addis Ababa.

The International Review has already on several occasions given information about the school textbook, nearly a million copies of which have now been published by the ICRC. The article below contains a statement on the different editions at the end of August 1971.

Last year the International Review published an article on the Middle East activities of the International Committee of the Red Cross from June 1967 to June 1970, which also dealt with the relief sent or transmitted by the ICRC.