II. Facilities for detention pending deportation Detention pending deportation is partly enforced in Germany in separate facilities, and partly in wings within prisons. A facility for detention pending deportation was inspected in the period under review. The Commission addressed its recommendations to the competent Interior Administration of the Federal Land visited. III. Berlin-Köpenick facility for detention pending deportation in April 2011 The Commission of the Länder carried out a visit in Berlin-Köpenick facility for detention pending deportation on 8 April 2011. The inspection focussed on the accommodation wings for male and female detainees awaiting deportation, the reception area, the separation area, as well as the visiting area. During its rounds, the members of the Commission held discussions with the head of the detention centre, the psychiatrist, a physician under contract, as well as the social worker. Furthermore, it spoke with several detainees awaiting deportation. The facility has an occupancy capacity of 214 detention places, 39 of which were occupied at the time of the inspection. The Senate Administration did not reply until 14 June 2011 to the request submitted on 15 April 2011 to provide information on the staffing situation. Because of this delay in forwarding the requested documents, it was not possible to complete the inspection report of the Commission of the Länder until 17 June 2011. The statement of the Senate Administration on this examination report was finally received on 10 August 2011. Its content was unconvincing in many ways; additionally, it gave the impression that the tasks of the National Agency are not taken seriously. For instance, the request by the Commission of the Länder to equip the joint showers with partitions was rejected by referring to the “normal standard of German swimming baths”. The Commission of the Länder was therefore forced to contradict individual items of the statement in a renewed letter. Furthermore, it announced in its letter that it would continue the discussion on individual items in its Annual Report and where appropriate in public since, once more, the letter of the National Agency had remained unanswered for weeks. The Berliner Zeitung reported on the information provided by the Commission of the Länder in an article on 5 October 2011. Thereupon, a fax from the Berlin Senator for the Interior was received on the same day by the secretariat of the National Agency for the Prevention of Torture containing a statement on the Commission’s second letter. Recommendations of the Commission of the Länder Despite an appropriate recommendation of the CPT from 1997, there is still no routine medical and psychological examination on arrival.24 Particularly when it comes to detainees 24 Reaction of the Senate Administration for the Interior and Sport (Berlin) There is said to be no obligatory reception examination for the inmates of detention pending deportation facilities in Berlin apart from the TBC X-ray examination cf. CPT, 1999, Report to the German Government on the visit to Frankfurt am Main Airport carried out by the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) from 25 to 27 May 1998, Strasbourg, p. 15. 60