CAT/C/TCD/CO/1
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risks and inadequate health care, and violation of inmates’ right to visits. The Committee is
concerned about reports of a failure to separate juvenile from adult prisoners and persons
awaiting trial from convicted prisoners. It is also concerned at the reference in legislation
governing pretrial detention to the undefined concept of a “reasonable” period and at reports that
some persons awaiting trial have been detained in a remand centre for a period longer than the
sentence incurred (arts. 11 and 16).
The State party should take urgent measures to bring conditions of detention in
gendarmeries, police stations and remand centres into line with the United Nations
Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, in particular by:
(a) Reducing prison overcrowding, including by considering non-custodial
forms of detention, and, in the case of children in conflict with the law, by ensuring
that detention is only used as a measure of last resort;
(b)
Improving the food and the health care provided to detainees;
(c) Reorganizing prisons so that persons awaiting trial are detained
separately from convicted prisoners and improving the conditions of detention for
minors, ensuring that they are detained separately from adults in all circumstances;
(d) Reducing the frequency and duration of incarceration of persons awaiting
trial, including by amending the Code of Criminal Procedure in order to set a
maximum length of pretrial detention;
(e) Taking appropriate measures to put a definitive end to alleged corruption
and ransom demands in prisons;
(f)
Strengthening judicial supervision of conditions of detention.
26. The Committee notes with satisfaction that some non-governmental organizations (NGOs)
have been granted permanent authorization to visit N’Djamena remand centre, but regrets that
such access is not granted to all places of detention and that it is restricted to announced,
accompanied visits with no possibility of communicating with detainees. The Committee notes
the mandate entrusted to the National Human Rights Commission to monitor places of detention,
but regrets that this body is unable to do so (art. 11).
The State party should adopt all appropriate measures to enable NGOs to carry out
periodic, independent, unannounced and unrestricted visits to places of detention.
The State party should also provide all the human and financial resources necessary
to enable the National Human Rights Commission to effectively carry out its
mandate.
National Human Rights Commission
27. The Committee notes with concern that the National Human Rights Commission is no
longer operational, owing in particular to a lack of human and financial resources. Furthermore,
the Committee regrets that the Commission does not comply with the Paris Principles in respect
of its membership, lack of independence and lack of pluralism (arts. 2, 11 and 13).