CAT/OP/CHE/ROSP/1 II. Cooperation 11. The Subcommittee wishes to express its gratitude to the authorities and to the liaison officers for their help and assistance relating to the planning and undertaking of the delegation’s visit. 12. Throughout the visit, the delegation enjoyed excellent cooperation from the federal and cantonal authorities and the staff of the institutions it visited. It was able to gain access without delay to all the institutions it wished to visit and to conduct private interviews with persons deprived of their liberty. 13. During the mission, the delegation noted with regret the lack of national statistics giving an overview of certain issues, including the processing of and follow-up to complaints, the implementation and extension of therapeutic measures under article 59 of the Criminal Code and of indefinite detention under article 64 of the Code, and the overall trends in respect of such measures. The Subcommittee is of the view that establishing official statistics systematically at the national level would enable the authorities to analyse the impact of the legislative reforms and the policies being pursued; more specifically, such statistics would improve follow-up to complaints and allow problems that come to light to be addressed as needed. 14. The Subcommittee recommends that official statistics be collected systematically by canton, then centralized and published by the Federal Statistical Office. These statistics should be analysed and made available to all stakeholders. III. National preventive mechanism 15. Federal Act No. 150.1 of 20 March 2009 on the Commission for the Prevention of Torture, which entered into force on 1 January 2010, established the National Commission for the Prevention of Torture, designated it the national preventive mechanism for Switzerland and gave it jurisdiction over the entire territory of the State party. 16. Under articles 17 and 18 of the Optional Protocol, States parties must guarantee the functional independence of national preventive mechanisms and the independence of their personnel, ensure that the experts of the mechanisms have the required capabilities and professional knowledge, and undertake to make available the necessary resources for the functioning of the mechanisms. A. Structure and independence 17. The Federal Council appoints the members of the National Commission for the Prevention of Torture, who are nominated by the Federal Department of Justice and Police and the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs. Non-governmental organizations can propose candidates to the federal departments in question, in accordance with Federal Act No. 150.1. The Commission was established as a body with administrative links to the Federal Department of Justice and Police. 18. While the State party is free to determine the format of its national preventive mechanism, it must ensure that the mechanism is fully compliant with the Optional Protocol, taking account also of the Subcommittee’s guidelines on national preventive mechanisms (CAT/OP/12/5). In addition to its institutional independence, the functional and operational independence of the mechanism must also be guaranteed, in accordance with the principles relating to the status of national institutions for the promotion and protection of human rights (the Paris Principles). 19. The administrative status of the National Commission for the Prevention of Torture was assessed in the legal opinion drafted by Walter Kälin and Manfred Nowak, who found 4 GE.21-03779