A/72/44 regarding the perpetrators, methods and location of torture in Egypt, as well as the trend of impunity for perpetrators. 69. Torture appears to occur particularly frequently following arbitrary arrests and is often carried out to obtain a confession or to punish and threaten political dissenters. Torture occurs in police stations, prisons, State security facilities, and Central Security Forces facilities. Torture is perpetrated by police officers, military officers, National Security officers and prison guards. However, prosecutors, judges and prison officials also facilitate torture by failing to curb practices of torture, arbitrary detention and ill-treatment or to act on complaints. Many documented incidents occurred in greater Cairo, but cases have also been reported throughout the country. Perpetrators of torture almost universally enjoy impunity, although Egyptian law prohibits and creates accountability mechanisms for torture and related practices, demonstrating a serious dissonance between law and practice. In the view of the Committee, all the above lead to the inescapable conclusion that torture is a systematic practice in Egypt. 70. The Committee made urgent recommendations to the State party, including to immediately end the practice of torture and ill-treatment in all places of detention; to ensure that officials at the highest level publicly condemn torture and ill-treatment by State agents and adopt a zero-tolerance policy; and to prosecute perpetrators of torture, including those with command or superior responsibility. Comments and observations of Egypt concerning the inquiry report 71. On 1 June 2016, the Government of Egypt provided a reply to the Committee’s findings stating that the Committee should not have concluded that the State party was engaging in systematic torture on the basis of its failure to respond to specific allegations made by Alkarama, which it said were based on hearsay and lacked supporting evidence. The State party accepted many of the Committee’s recommendations and asserted that they were already being implemented and that several others had been partly accepted or noted. It rejected the Committee’s recommendations to immediately end the use of incommunicado detention; create an independent authority to investigate allegations of torture, enforced disappearance and ill-treatment; restrict the jurisdiction of the military courts to offences of an exclusively military nature; and enforce the prohibition against “virginity tests” and end the practice of forensic anal examinations for those accused of crimes. VI. Consideration of complaints under article 22 of the Convention A. Introduction 72. Under article 22 of the Convention, individuals who claim to be victims of a violation by a State party of the provisions of the Convention may submit a complaint to the Committee against Torture for consideration, subject to the conditions laid down in that article. Sixty-seven States parties to the Convention have declared that they recognize the competence of the Committee to receive and consider complaints under article 22 of the Convention. No complaint may be considered by the Committee if it concerns a State party to the Convention that has not recognized the Committee’s competence under article 22. 73. In accordance with rule 104, paragraph 1, of its rules of procedure, the Committee established the post of Rapporteur on new complaints and interim measures, which is currently held by Mr. Zhang. 74. Complaints under article 22 of the Convention are considered in closed meetings. All documents relating to the work of the Committee under article 22, that is, submissions from the parties and other working documents of the Committee, are confidential. 75. The Committee decides on a complaint in the light of all the information made available to it by the parties. The findings of the Committee are communicated to the 14