ANNUAL REPORT 2019-OMBUDSMANNATIONAL PREVENTIVE MECHANISM personnel, material and financial resources to be provided from the Budget of the Republic of North Macedonia. Implemented preventive visits in 2019 The Ombudsman-National Preventive Mechanism, within its mandate and competencies, during 2019 continued to implement and put into action the obligations arising from the Optional Protocol to the United Nations Convention against Torture and the commitments to combating torture and zero tolerance, in case of its existence. In this regard, during the reporting year, the National Preventive Mechanism conducted a total of 22 regularly planned visits in accordance with the work plan and programme and several extraordinary (ad-hoc) visits, in coordination and cooperation with other units within the Ombudsman. All visits by the team of the National Preventive Mechanism were conducted as unannounced, of which 13 to police stations, 3 visits to psychiatric hospitals, 4 visits to penitentiary-correctional institutions, as well as 2 visits to penitentiary-correctional and educational-correctional institutions for children. During the conducted preventive visits, external associates were engaged, that is, experts and professionals from the Association of Psychiatrists, the Institute of Forensic Medicine, Criminology and Medical Deontology, the Association of Special Education Specialists, the Association of Social Workers of the City of Skopje, the Association for Criminal Law and Criminology, the Association of Nurses, Technicians and Midwives of the Republic of Macedonia, the Chamber of Psychologists, as well as the Macedonian Association of Young Lawyers. The external associates provided expert and professional approach in analysing the situations, actions and conditions in places of deprivation or restriction of freedom of movement. NPM prepared special reports with specific recommendations relating to the performed visits and the established conditions, which were submitted to the heads of the institutions and to the relevant ministries in order to undertake measures and activities to eliminate the identified shortcomings. 16