33 6.1. Police custody (police stations) NPM carried out 41 visits to police stations72 during 2012 and sent more than 100 recommendations to remedy the irregularities identified during the visits73. In Serbia, the majority of police custody facilities are not in line with existing standards. Poor conditions of the existing police custody facilities are justified by the lack of funds for their renovation. Indeed, adaptation of the premises typically situated in the basements of police stations and generally damp, would require unreasonably large sums of money. However, it would be financially reasonable if police custody facilities were to be situated in such areas of police stations not ruined or damp, and where possible without major difficulties to provide a direct flow of air and natural light. Several hours of detention within inadequate police custody facilities in its continuity can lead to torture, and whatever the case may be, it represents degrading treatment. In some police stations, there are no special police custody facilities, or they are not utilized at all for being unusable, hence the detainees are kept in offices or placed in remand departments in the prison itself. Such practice of keeping detainees for several hours in the offices and especially coming to all day detention should be discontinued immediately. Placement of persons in need of police custody in the remand departments located within the prison facilities is justified by the fact that there are better living conditions, despite the fact that remand departments are generally filled to capacity being inadequate, causing both organizational and security concerns, which may lead to infringement of rights of detainees, therefore this practice should be discontinued with in the future. NPM found that 24 police stations use special custody areas which to a greater or lesser extent are not in line with the basic minimum standards. The recommendations were sent to completely suspend the police custody function in nine police stations in the existing areas designated for that purpose, due to their inadequacy, and to adapt police custody facilities to the existing standards74 in another 15 police stations. 72 73 74 In Republic of Serbia there are around 200 police stations, within 27 Police Administrations NPM reports on the subject of visits to the Police Administration / stations in 2012 including recommendations for correction of deficiencies, available at http://www.ombudsman.rs/nacionalni mehanizam za prevenciju torture; NPM recommendations in reports concerning visits to Police Administrations/stations in 2012 are available at http://www.ombudsman.rs/nacionalni mehanizam za prevenciju torture;