FACTSHEET As new technology is constantly emerging, monitors have the difficult task of keeping up to date with the new instruments in use, and with evidence related to the safety and safe use of devices (and techniques) of restraint. To this end, monitoring bodies may need to enquire why and how certain instruments are purchased (either by the central administration or the individual facility) and examine information provided by manufacturers about the intended purpose and ‘safe use’. Monitors may want to ask prison staff how they apply such devices. Open questions on what instruments are in use, in which situations, for how long and whether prison staff perceive them as ‘effective’ may generate more uninfluenced information than asking how requirements of necessity and proportionality are met. It may be appropriate for monitors to inspect the facilities to locate such instruments on their own. Monitors can also enquire whether detainees’ files include any mention of the application of restraints and the reasons for it. In Lahore, the Inspector General and the Superintendent initially denied that they even had fetters available to show the Special Rapporteur. During the visit to the punishment cell block a member of the delegation saw approximately a dozen leg irons neatly stacked against the wall of an empty cell.67 Monitoring bodies may find that prison staff are ignorant of the regulations as well as the risks, or that they perceive the use of restraints to be the easiest or indeed only way to deal with tensions, inter-prisoner violence or the risk of self-harm or suicide. The reports and recommendations of monitoring bodies should therefore include guidance on alternative, human rights compliant methods to cope with the difficult situations that may occur in custodial settings. Recommendations may need to be directed to the central administration, if regulation is lacking or inconsistent with international standards, or to the particular detention administration where their use in practice does not adhere to the directives in place. The devices in use and their application may differ considerably depending on the type of detention (eg. whether police custody, prison, detention centre pending deportation or juvenile detention facility), and may even vary from one place of detention to another. Lastly, authorities may tell monitors that they can conduct an interview with a certain detainee, but only if he/she remains handcuffed. Monitors will have to take a decision on whether the conditions of such an interview provide the atmosphere needed for a confidential, uninfluenced conversation. Where security concerns do in fact exist, alternative means should be sought, such as the presence of a guard in sight but out of hearing. If the interviewee was not expecting such a situation, the monitors should reassure themselves that he/she still consents to participate in the interview. 67. See E/CN.4/1997/7/Add.2, paras. 54 and 56, op.cit. Penal Reform International | Instruments of restraint: Addressing risk factors to prevent torture and ill-treatment |9