The following interrogation techniques are not torture.

(a) wall-standing: forcing the detainees to remain for periods of some hours in a "stress position";

(b) hooding: putting a black or navy coloured bag over the detainees' heads and, at least initially, keeping it there all the time except during interrogation;

(c) subjection to noise: pending their interrogations, holding the detainees in a room where there was a continuous loud and hissing noise;

(d) deprivation of sleep: pending their interrogations, depriving the detainees of sleep;

(e) deprivation of food and drink: subjecting the detainees to a reduced diet during their stay at the centre and pending interrogations.

Those exact "five techniques" were used by the British Army on suspected IRA terrorists in Northern Ireland in August and October 1971 when detention without trial was practiced in the name of preventing terror attacks. In due course, the Republic of Ireland government made a formal complaint to the European Court of Human Rights on behalf of the victims. The complaint was based on Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) which states:

No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

In January 1978, the European Court of Human Rights passed down its decision in the case. As well as describing in great detail the circumstances and its deliberatons, the court held by thirteen votes to four (para 96) that the use of the "five techniques" in that case did not constitute torture within the meaning of Article 3. On the other hand this landmark judgement was that the Court:

3. holds by sixteen votes to one that the use of the five techniques in August and October 1971 constituted a practice of inhuman and degrading treatment, which practice was in breach of Article 3

This provision of the ECHR should not be confused with Article 3 of the Third Geneva Convention which requires minimum provisions including:

(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria. To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:

(a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;

(b) taking of hostages;

(c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment;

(d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.

The ECHR case would presumably provide the precendent on which to base a War Crimes prosecution, even if those specific techniques were not outlawed by Dutch military law. It does however mean that if the treatment meted out by those Dutch soldiers was materially worse than the Northern Ireland case, the prosecution could argue that it had graduated from cruel and inhuman treatment to torture.