Report on the Performance of the Activities of the National Preventive Mechanism for 2019 CONCLUSION It is encouraging that in 2019 we found no practice that might constitute torture; however, practice that might be considered inhuman or degrading is worrying, as are violations of the constitutional and legal rights of persons deprived of their liberty. Although progress in certain segments is visible, the changes have not been rapid enough. Hence, we encounter the same problems year after year, and when they do begin to be resolved, this is often only partially. This also concerns the need to continue to bring accommodation conditions in all penal institutions up to legal and international standards, as well as the need for continued training of prison system staff, so that in their everyday work they can act in a way that respects the human rights of persons deprived of their liberty. It is also necessary to continue education of police officers on the use of means of coercion during their proceedings. Likewise, in order to ensure that investigations in cases of citizens' complaints regarding police treatment are effective, it is necessary to take statements both from the complainants themselves and from other witnesses, and answers to citizens' complaints need to clearly state the possibility of submitting an objection. Patients in all psychiatric institutions need to be adequately informed on the aim, nature, effects, benefits and risks of certain medical procedures, as well as their rights. In addition, in these institutions too, the accommodation conditions need to be fully harmonized with the international and legal standards, which they still are not; it is also necessary to keep up-to-date records of all the means of coercion applied on persons committed in the institutions. In many homes for elderly, residents with impaired mobility and immobile residents are not housed on the ground floor, which could make evacuating them difficult if need arose – a problem we also encountered in the care home we visited in 2019. Moreover, the living conditions in stationary units need to be brought into line with the Ordinance on the minimum conditions for provision of social services. In police treatment of irregular migrants, all the procedures envisaged in domestic, international and EU law should be observed in every individual case, while conducting independent and effective investigations is key to establishing beyond doubt whether individual complaints and allegations by OCDs and international NGOs are founded. Furthermore, NPM representatives need to be allowed unannounced and free access to data on the treatment of irregular migrants, which is still not the case. The aforementioned examples are some of the possible solutions to the problems described in this Report, and are part of the recommendations focused on strengthening the protection of the human rights of persons deprived of their liberty and persons whose freedom of movement is restricted. Their implementation would certainly also strengthen the rule of law in Croatia. 35