ABSTRACT
In September 2009, Switzerland became the fiftieth state to ratify the Optional Protocol to the 1984 UN Convention against Torture. Not only did this mean that, in a little less than seven years since its adoption, the Optional Protocol had become ratified by more than a third of states parties to the UNCAT,2 but it also meant that, in accordance with Article 5(1) of the OPCAT, the size of the treaty body which it established would increase in size from its original 10 members to 25.3 This makes it the largest of the nine (soon to be 10) treaty bodies established by the UN human rights treaties.4
