CONCLUSIONS end RECOMMENDATIONS 155 4. Reports based on the monitoring results and containing proposals on improvement of the situation with the respect of human rights and freedoms were communicated to the leaderships of the relevant public authorities. However, the senior officials of such ministries and agencies did not always properly respond to the Ombudsman’s recommendations or provided incorrect information about measures to carry out such recommendations (Ministry of Health Care, Ministry of Internal Affairs). 5. Monitoring of custodial settings enabled identification of a number of systemic violations of human rights and freedoms, inclusive, notably, of the following: • failure to provide for the basic needs of persons held in custodial settings (anti-sanitary conditions, lack of access to free air and drinking water, inappropriate diet and medical support); • mental and physical violence on the part of law enforcement personnel at the stage of pre-trial investigation and on the part of penitentiary institutional personnel with regard to convicted prisoners; • degrading treatment practices (lengthy handcuffing during convoying of military servicemen who committed minor offenses, absence of partitions in toilets and shower rooms, etc.); • groundless restrictions in communication with the outer world (groundless requirements regarding issuance of passes to residential institutions, restrictions on communication with parents as a punishment at social rehabilitation schools, etc.); • failure to inform persons held in custodial settings about their rights or ways of appeal against unlawful actions of the administration; • inefficient checks on ill-treatment complaints or their investigations by prosecutor’s offices and relevant services and units of the Ministry of Health Care, Ministry of Internal Affairs and State Penitentiary Service. In many instances checkups were assigned to the heads of institutions found to perform with shortcomings, which was not conducive to efficient measures for elimination of such shortcomings.