Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for various reasons, including punishment, extracting a confession, interrogation for information, or intimidating third parties.
Captured Viet Cong soldier, blindfolded and tied in a stress position by American forces during the Vietnam War, 1967.
Two Elamite chiefs flayed alive after the Battle of Ulai, Assyrian relief
"The custody of a criminal does not require torture" by Francisco Goya, c. 1812
Tear gas used during the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests. Use of tear gas on protestors is sometimes considered a form of torture.
Interrogational torture is the use of torture to obtain information in interrogation, as opposed to the use of torture to extract a forced confession, regardless of whether it is true or false. Torture has been used throughout history during interrogation, although it is now illegal and a violation of international law.
Two United States soldiers and one South Vietnamese soldier waterboard a captured North Vietnamese prisoner of war near Da Nang, 1968.
The U.S. Senate Report on the CIA's use of torture during the War on Terror.