International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims
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| Founded | 1985 by Inge Genefke |
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Non-profit NGO |
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| Website |
www.irct.org worldwithouttorture.org |
The International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (IRCT), is an independent, international health professional organization that promotes and supports the rehabilitation of torture victims and works for the prevention of torture worldwide.
Based in Denmark, the IRCT is the umbrella organization for 144 independent torture rehabilitation organizations in over 70 countries that treat and assist torture survivors and their families. They advocate for holistic rehabilitation for all victims of torture, which can include access to justice, reparations, and medical, psychological and psycho-social counseling.
The IRCT does this through to strengthening the capacity of their membership, enabling an improved policy environment for torture victims, and generating and share knowledge on issues related to the rehabilitation of torture victims.
Professionals at the IRCT rehabilitation centers and programs provide treatment for an estimated 100,000 survivors of torture every year. Victims receive multidisciplinary support including medical and psychological care and legal aid. The aim of the rehabilitation process is to empower torture survivors to resume as full a life as possible.
The medical response to the problem of torture began in 1973 with the launch of a campaign by Amnesty International (AI) to help and diagnose torture victims. At this time, very little was known about torture methods or the physical or psychosocial consequences for torture victims.
The first AI group to start this work was founded in Denmark in 1974 and consisted of four voluntary doctors. This group was part of a network of some 4,000 medical doctors from 34 countries worldwide.
It quickly became evident that, in addition to documenting cases of torture for use in potential legal proceedings, it was also critical to identify methods to help treat and rehabilitate victims of torture.
This resulted in the establishment in 1978 of the first medical international working group to address the rehabilitation of torture victims, which held the first international medical seminar on torture, Violations of Human Rights - Torture and the Medical Profession, in Athens, Greece.
In 1979, members of the Danish medical group obtained permission to admit and examine torture victims at Copenhagen University Hospital, in Denmark. Three years later, in 1982, the Rehabilitation and Research Centre for Torture Victims (RCT) was founded in Copenhagen by Dr. Inge Genefke, MD, as an independent institution with its own premises.
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Wikipedia