A/HRC/13/39/Add.4 – directly ordered by the Government or a Minister - frequently took place at unofficial places of detention. 43. In other police and gendarmerie custody facilities, the Special Rapporteur received only few recent allegations of torture and ill-treatment. Rather, his interlocutors indicated that, in recent years, detainees were normally transferred to the central police stations of Malabo or Bata fairly quickly. C. Groups made vulnerable in detention Women 44. In violation of international norms6 women in prisons as well as in police and gendarmerie custody were not separated from male adults and were therefore extremely vulnerable to sexual violence and other forms of abuse. Several witnesses reported that female detainees were regularly asked to provide sexual services to officers, guards and male co-detainees, sometimes in exchange for food or other commodities. The Special Rapporteur received consistent allegations of sexual violence and harassment against foreign women in prisons and police custody – officers practically put them “at the disposal” of Equatoguinean men. When the women asked for protection, they were told off. 45. The Special Rapporteur found several women who were pregnant from co-prisoners and learned that since women could freely intermingle with men, it was frequently in the women’s interest to choose one of them for a special relationship in order to be protected from other male prisoners. In the Special Rapporteur’s assessment, no mechanisms to protect women from exploitation were in place. He also received allegations that pregnant women had little, if any, access to medical care. Children 46. In violation of international norms, in prisons as well as in police and gendarmerie custody, there was no separation of minors from adults. The Special Rapporteur received several allegations of harassment and sexual violence of minors. In one interview, a boy told the Special Rapporteur that he was afraid because some people in the prison were “not good and force me to do things I do not want to do”. In particular he was afraid of the night, when beatings and “bad things” happen. 47. In one case that was brought to the attention of the Special Rapporteur, a group of girls aged between 11 and 14, in absence of a legal basis, had been “sentenced” to public shaving by a judge, which was conducted in front of their parents. In the view of the Special Rapporteur, this constitutes degrading punishment. 48. The Special Rapporteur also was told in several instances (e.g. at Malabo Central Police) that, although the Criminal Code sets 16 as the age of criminal responsibility, young children, the youngest aged 9, had been detained and were released just prior to his arrival. Foreigners 49. The conditions in which immigrants pending deportation were held in police stations often for very long periods of time were even worse than for Equatoguineans. They had no 6 14 Namely para. 8 of the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners adopted by the First United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, held at Geneva in 1955, and approved by the Economic and Social Council by its resolutions 663 C (XXIV) of 31 July 1957 and 2076 (LXII) of 13 May 1977.