mental well-being of the victims, including the anxiety, anguish and grief caused by the denial of justice.110 The European Court of Human Rights has mainly considered the failure to effectively investigate and prosecute allegations of torture as falling under the procedural limb of the substantive prohibition of torture (Article 3). However, it has also found that shortcomings in the investigation of enforced disappearances, such as procedural delays, including the failure to provide information to relatives, “are elements contributing to the applicant’s suffering” and may constitute ill-treatment violating Article 3 of the Convention.111 The prospect that delays in proceedings, in particular prolonged arbitrary detention may in itself constitute torture or ill-treatment has been raised in relation to the detention practice in Guantánamo Bay.112 Human rights bodies have considered prolonged detention as a possible violation of the prohibition of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment in their the jurisprudence on the so-called death-row phenomenon (waiting for one’s execution for a prolonged period of time in special detention units).113 The European Court of Human Rights have also found violations in cases where the detention conditions were such that, combined with the length of detention, they constituted degrading treatment.114 The Human Rights Committee held in Mr. C v. Australia that the continued detention of a detainee suffering from severe mental illness constitutes a violation of article 7 where the State party fails “to take the steps necessary to ameliorate the author’s mental deterioration.”115 These cases do not directly address the question whether, and if so under what circumstances, prolonged detention without trial per se amounts to a violation of the prohibition of torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. A convincing argument can be made that the use of such detention, in particular where it is used as a strategy to wear down detainees in order to make them confess or to punish them, causes such a level of pain and suffering that it can, depending on the circumstances, in and of itself constitute ill-treatment if not torture. The rationale of the Human Rights Committee’s decision in Mr. C v. Australia must apply even more so in cases where prolonged detention without trial is used to, or inevitably results in causing mental suffering without the state in question taking any steps either to expedite proceedings or to lessen the mental suffering through other appropriate measures, in particular release. 110 Mapiripán massacre v Colombia, paras.145, 146; 19 Tradesmen v Colombia, para.215. 111 Kukayev v Russia, para.108; Magomadov and Magomadov v. Russia, paras.119, 120; Alikhadzhiyeva v. Russia, paras.81, 82; Orhan v Turkey, paras.358 et seq. and Kurt v. Turkey, paras.133, 134. 112 Human Rights Council, ‘Situation of Detainees at Guantánamo Bay,’ E/CN.4/2006/120 (27 February 2006), para.87. 113 See the decision by the Human Rights Committee in Wilson v Philippines, para.7.4 (with further references to the jurisprudence of the Committee). 114 Alver v. Estonia, para.56 and Dougoz v. Greece, para.48. 115 Mr. C. v. Australia, para.8.4. 25