had taken part in a mass protest for democracy in that country. Reportedly used during the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein in Iraq (1979–2003). Reportedly used in Tunisia by security forces. Recent research in imaging of torture victims confirms it is still used in several other countries. Foot whipping amongst other methods is still practised today in the torture of prisoners in Russia. Foot whipping is a common torture method in Saudi Arabia. In literature In act V, scene I of the Shakespearean comedy As You Like It, Touchstone threatens William with the line: "I will deal in poison with thee, or in bastinado, or in steel..." In act I, scene X of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's opera, Die Entführung aus dem Serail ("The Abduction from the Seraglio"), Osmin threatens Belmonte and Pedrillo with bastinado: "Sonst soll die Bastonade Euch gleich zu Diensten steh'n." (lit. "Or the bastonade will serve you soon."). In act I, scene XIX of Mozart's opera The Magic Flute, Sarastro orders Monostatos to be punished with 77 blows on the soles of his feet: "He! gebt dem Ehrenmann sogleich/nur sieben und siebenzig Sohlenstreich'." (lit. "Give the gentleman immediately just seventy-seven strokes on the soles.") In Chapter 8, Climatic Conditions, of Robert Irwin's novel The Arabian Nightmare, Sultan's doppelgänger is discovered and is questioned. "He was bastinadoed lightly to make him talk (for a heavy bastinado killed), but the man sobered up quickly and said nothing." In Chapter 58 of Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain, a member of Twain's party goes to collect a specimen from the face of the Sphinx and Twain sends a sheik to warn him of the consequences: "...by the laws of Egypt the crime he was attempting to commit was punishable with imprisonment or the bastinado." In Henri Charrière's Papillon, the author recalls having this done to him at Devil's Island, whereupon he had to be carried about in a wheelbarrow, with the soles of his feet resting against garden fork handles. In Tony Anthony's autobiography: Taming the Tiger, he was tortured and interrogated by Cyprian policemen using primarily this method, before being imprisoned in Nicosia central prison. When "Gonzo" journalist Hunter S. Thompson ran an unsuccessful campaign for Sheriff of Pitkin County, Colorado, in 1970, he said his plan for dealing with the illicit drug trade was that "My first act as Sheriff will be to install, on the courthouse lawn, a bastinado