2013 News
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee holds high-level talks in Ukraine
The talks were organised in the aftermath of police interventions on 30 November 2013 at Independence Square and on 1 December 2013 on Bankova Street in Kyiv. According to various reports, supported by public video footage, excessive force had been used by police officers when dispersing...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on the Russian Federation
In Moscow and Saint Petersburg, most of the detained persons had no complaints about the manner in which they were treated by law enforcement officials; however, the CPT’s delegation did receive some allegations of recent physical ill-treatment by members of law enforcement agencies. The...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Monaco
No allegations of deliberate physical ill-treatment were heard from persons detained by the police. In its report, the CPT highlights the efforts by the Monegasque authorities to implement essential CPT recommendations in respect of safeguards against police ill-treatment. It notes the inclusion...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Iceland
Most of the persons with recent experience of police custody who were interviewed by the CPT’s delegation stated that they had been treated in a correct manner. The conclusion reached by the Committee after its previous visits – namely that persons detained by the police in Iceland run little...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee visits Azerbaijan
The main objective of the visit was to review the implementation of recommendations made after previous CPT visits concerning the treatment of persons deprived of their liberty in psychiatric hospitals and social care homes. The delegation held consultations with Oktay SHIRALIYEV, Minister of...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Portugal
In the 15 months since the February 2012 periodic visit to Portugal, overcrowding within the prison system had increased further. Lisbon Central Prison, the main focus of the visit, continued to be affected by chronic overcrowding of almost 150% and very poor material conditions. Damp cells,...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes two reports on Italy
In the course of the 2012 visit, the CPT received a number of allegations of physical ill-treatment by State Police and Carabinieri officers, in particular in the Milan area and mostly concerning foreign nationals. Consequently, several recommendations are made in the report concerning the...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee urges European states to improve reporting of evidence of ill-treatment
In its annual report published today, the Committee points out that the documenting and reporting of medical evidence of ill-treatment is unsatisfactory in many European States. The procedures in place do not always guarantee that injuries borne by detained persons will be recorded appropriately...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Turkey
The main objective of the visit was to examine the treatment and conditions of detention of juveniles held in prisons. The visit was triggered by allegations received earlier in 2012 of ill-treatment of juvenile prisoners by prison staff and inter-prisoner violence at Pozantı Prison. The...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Bosnia and Herzegovina
The CPT’s delegation again received a considerable number of credible allegations of severe physical ill-treatment by the police in the Republika Srpska. The alleged ill-treatment mostly took the form of slaps, punches and kicks as well as blows with hard objects (such as baseball bats) to...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Ukraine - Report highlights need for further action to combat ill-treatment of sentenced prisoners
The CPT’s report indicates that there has been a definite improvement as regards the manner in which inmates are treated by staff in Correctional Colony No. 89 in Dnipropetrovsk, which was first visited by the Committee in 2009. It appears that the action taken to put a stop to the ill-treatment...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Latvia
In the course of the 2011 visit, the CPT’s delegation received a number of allegations from detained persons of physical ill-treatment by the police (consisting mainly of punches, kicks and inappropriate use of truncheons) at the time of apprehension and during questioning. Some of these...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Georgia
High-level talks held during the CPT’s visit mainly focused on the effectiveness of criminal investigations launched following the publication, on 18 September 2012, of video material containing scenes of apparent serious ill-treatment of prisoners by staff in certain penitentiary establishments....
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee visits the Russian Federation
The main objective of the visit was to review the implementation of recommendations made after previous visits regarding the treatment of persons deprived of their liberty by law enforcement agencies. For this purpose, the delegation interviewed numerous detained persons who had recently been or...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Slovenia
In the course of the visit, the Committee’s delegation examined the treatment and conditions of detention of persons held in police facilities, prisons and psychiatric establishments. The CPT received only a few isolated allegations of police ill-treatment; they concerned excessive use of force...
Forced return flights from the UK: the European anti-torture committee publishes its first report
In its report, the CPT concludes that “each stage of the preparation of the removal process was carefully planned and organised, staff were well briefed, and every effort was made for the removal to be carried out in a humane way”. However, the CPT makes several recommendations and comments...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Malta
The visit mainly focused on Corradino Correctional Facility, the only prison in Malta. In certain parts of the prison, material conditions of detention had significantly improved since the CPT’s previous visit in 2008. However, major shortcomings were found once again in several other areas of...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes two reports on Spain
In the course of the 2011 visit, the CPT’s delegation examined the treatment of persons detained by law enforcement agencies. The report highlights several allegations of serious physical ill-treatment by officers of the Civil Guard (Guardia Civil) in respect of persons held in incommunicado...
Council of Europe anti-torture Committee publishes report on Portugal
In the course of the 2012 visit, the CPT’s delegation examined the treatment of persons deprived of their liberty by law enforcement agencies and of the safeguards against ill-treatment in place. The report on the visit highlights several cases of alleged ill-treatment and stresses the importance...
Council of Europe Secretary General welcomes publication of anti-torture Committee report on the Russian Federation - Report makes critical assessment of treatment of detained persons in Northern Caucasus
“ I am confident that this is the beginning of a new policy of the Russian Federation which will increase the impact of the Committee’s work in Russia, to everyone’s benefit,” added CPT President Lətif Hüseynov. In a report published today, the Council of Europe’s Committee for the Prevention of...
Preventing torture in Europe
www.cpt.coe.int