100 MONITORING OF CUSTODIAL SETTINGS IN UKRAINE: conference “Accomplishments of modern science in current penitentiary practice”. NPM staff took part in the round table discussion held on September 18, 2013 and attended by representatives of Prosecutor General’s Office, Ministry of Justice and SPSU that addressed the issue of unimpeded mailing for persons taken into custody and convicted prisoners and featured a debate on the procedure of receipt, acceptance and dispatch of such correspondence. In this regard the Commissioner for Human Rights sent a letter to the Prosecutor General of Ukraine (of August 14, 2013) on failure of penitentiary and prison administrations to comply with the requirements of the Laws of Ukraine “On the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights” and “On Preliminary Detention” and of the Criminal Enforcement Code of Ukraine. The Prosecutor General’ Office of Ukraine replied about its official response action, elimination of the earlier revealed violations of the law and imposition of disciplinary liability on the culpable individuals. The joint meeting held on October 18, 2013 under the chairmanship of the Ombudsman and with participation of representatives of Prosecutor General’ Office, Ministry of Justice, State Penitentiary Service of Ukraine and the Ombudsman’s Secretariat, addressed establishment of a working group to promote enhancement of safeguards of the rights and freedoms of persons held at SPSU institutions. A working meeting with the heads of relevant ministries and agencies occurred on November 4, 2013; its participants determined the areas of activity of the joint group to increase the efficiency of implementation of the state policy in the sphere of human rights and freedoms. Two round table meetings initiated by the Ombudsman assembled employees of the Presidential Administration, Prosecutor General’s Office, Ministry of Justice and the State Penitentiary Service; they discussed the draft of Internal procedures for penitentiary institutions. This draft reflected a number of proposals made by the Ombudsman and by NGO experts as to improvement of conditions of detention for convicts sentenced to life imprisonment with regard to prohibition of lifers’ weekly transfer from one cell to another and their handcuffing whenever out of cell, including movement in the territory of the institution or provision of medical assistance. In order to ensure legitimate interests of detained persons and convicted prisoners and the elimination of systematic violations of human rights in penitentiary institutions the Ombudsman made a number of submissions to the Minister of Justice of Ukraine, specifically: • regarding elimination of violations of the legislation on the use of special units of the State Penitentiary Service of Ukraine (of January 16, 2013) SPSU has for a long time its own special units, without proper regulations on their operation. State registration of the Order of the State Department of Ukraine for Enforcement of Punishments “On approval of the Provisions on the special purpose unit”, of October 10, 2005, No. 167, registered with the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine on February 16, 2006, No. 138/12012 (which set out the procedure for the use of special units in penitentiaries and remand prisons), was annulled on the basis of the Opinion of the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine of December 24, 2007 No. 15/ 88 by this Ministry’s Order of December 26, 2007, No. 1302/ 5). Considering abovementioned and in view of the availability of prisoners’