8 institutions lack staff, which then causes adverse consequences for both staff members and beneficiaries. The NPM conclusion is that among persons deprived of liberty, persons with mental and/or intellectual disorders placed in the social-protection institutions of a home type or psychiatric hospitals are in the most disadvantaged position, as well as those persons in the institutions for the enforcement of criminal sanctions6. In the course of 2015, NPM paid a special attention to monitoring the status of a large number of refugees and migrants, who, in the course of the refugee crisis went through the Republic of Serbia. According to the data of the Ministry of the Interior, in the course of 2015 almost 600,000 refugees/migrants were registered and issued certificates of having expressed the intention to seek asylum. Majority of them did not express the intention to get asylum in the Republic of Serbia, but the police officers despite that fact issued them certificates on the expressed intention to seek asylum (almost all those persons left the territory of the Republic of Serbia in a two-day time). Besides the aforementioned, another huge problem was the fact that transition of refugees through Serbia was not organized in an efficient way and that in such a situation risks of corruption and actions by informal groups were very big.7 In the course of 2015, state authorities took a liberal approach for treatment of refugees in transit. That implied no deprivation of liberty, and lack of any other restrictive measures. Refugees were enabled a smooth entry to Serbia, and upon registration, they were let to freely pass through Serbia taking the roads to the borders with Hungary and Croatia. Such a liberal approach opened a room for actions of informal groups to take advantage of a difficult position of refugees for their personal interest. 1.2. The most important data on the activities of the Protector of Citizens regarding the NPM activities in 20158 In the course of 2015, NPM conducted 117 visits to institutions where persons deprived of their liberty were placed. The total of 55 reports were composed, and the total of 265 recommendations were issued to the competent authorities by the way of these reports. As a part of the regular visits, the visits were conducted to the total of 61 institutions, specifically: 40 police stations, 10 prisons, 2 psychiatric hospitals and 2 centres for mental health, 3 institutions of social protection of a home type, and 4 visits to the airport “Nikola Tesla”. Based on the preformed visits, all institutions were provided with the reports on visits, containing recommendations for rectifying all deficiencies observed in their work which might have led to or were causing ill-treatment. With the support by UNHCR, in the course of 2015, NPM, in cooperation with the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights, conducted 59 thematic visits to the institutions competent to deal with asylum seekers and refugees. The total of 30 reports on theses visits were composed, and 6Persons serving measure of compulsory psychiatric treatment and stay in the health-care institutions, measures of detention and prison sentence 7Analysis: Difference in treatments of refugees passing the Balkan route, no. 71-120/15 from 02/09/ 2016 8 For more information, see section 5 of this Report