E/CN.4/2006/6 page 5 From 10 to 16 September 2005 the Special Rapporteur visited Nepal, where he found the practice of torture to be systematic and practised by the police, the armed police, and the Royal Nepalese Army. These conclusions are based, inter alia, on the large number or serious allegations received, on convincing medical evidence and on surprisingly frank admissions by high police and military commanders that torture is indeed practised systematically against suspected Maoists. At the same time, he also found shocking cases of particularly cruel treatment and punishment committed by Maoist forces. From 21 November to 2 December, the Special Rapporteur visited China where he concluded that the practice of torture, though on the decline, still remains widespread in the country. He was particularly concerned about the continuing practice of forced re-education of persons with dissident or non-conformist opinions, aimed at changing their personality and breaking their will, both in special re-education through labour camps, regular prisons, and even in pretrial detention facilities. Such practices, in the opinion of the Special Rapporteur, constitute a systematic form of inhuman and degrading treatment and are incompatible with a modern society based on a culture of human rights, democracy and the rule of law. The findings, conclusions and recommendations of these visits can be found in the addenda to this report. 6. Concerning the joint request made in June 2004 for an invitation to visit the United States Naval Base at Guantánamo Bay, on 27 October 2005, the Government finally responded with an invitation to only three of the five experts of the Commission on Human Rights entrusted with a joint investigation, namely the Special Rapporteur on the question of torture, the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, and the Chairperson-Rapporteur of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. Moreover, the Government limited the visit to one day and explicitly excluded private interviews or visits with detainees. On 31 October, the experts agreed to the short duration of the visit and the limitation on the number of mandate-holders invited, and decided to visit the base on 6 December 2005. However, they could not accept the exclusion of private interviews with detainees, which, in the view of the experts, would not only contravene the terms of reference for fact-finding missions by special procedures, but would also undermine the purpose of making an objective and fair assessment of the situation of the detainees. On 18 November 2005, the experts reported that the Government did not accept this precondition for a visit, and therefore the mission envisaged for 6 December, unfortunately had to be cancelled. As indicated above, a joint report on the applicability of international human rights law to detention in Guantánamo, as well as the situation of human rights of the detainees, based on factual information gathered by various means, including from interviews with former detainees, is before the Commission. 7. The Special Rapporteur reports that in view of the previous invitations extended by the Governments of Paraguay and Bolivia, in addition to the positive indications received from the Governments of the Russian Federation (an invitation was first requested in 2000), Côte d’Ivoire (2005) and Togo (2005), he hopes to realize the visits to those countries in the near future. He regrets that despite long-standing requests, invitations have not been received from the Governments of Algeria (1997), Egypt (1996), India (1993), Indonesia (1993), Israel (2002), Tunisia (1998) and Turkmenistan (2003). In May 2005, the Special Rapporteur requested invitations from the Governments of Belarus, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, the Islamic Republic of Iran, Nigeria, Sri Lanka, the Syrian Arab Republic and Zimbabwe. In December 2005, the Special Rapporteur requested invitations from Afghanistan, Iraq, Jordan, the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Saudi Arabia and Yemen.