Drip drip

How about some news on another country's torture policies for a change?

China on Tuesday denounced a special U.N. investigator's report of widespread torture in this country, saying the researcher did not spend enough time here to draw an accurate conclusion.

The comments by Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang were China's first on the report Friday by Manfred Nowak at the end of a two-week trip to China.

Nowak, the U.N.'s first torture investigator to visit China, said inmates in detention centers in Beijing, Tibet and the Muslim-majority region of Xinjiang told him stories of beatings, electric shocks and sleep deprivation. One man said he was forced to lie in the same position for 85 days.

But Qin responded Tuesday that "China cannot accept the allegation that torture is widespread."

"We understand that the rapporteur's work is to find out problems and to give criticism, but within a short two weeks and a trip to only three cities, the rapporteur may jump to conclusions," the spokesman said at a regular briefing.

Chinese finger-cuffs are not torture, the spokesman continued.