except for the procedure and cases prescribed by Georgian legislation.’ With regard to the
aforementioned reservation, as early as on 19 December 2014, the Public Defender of
Georgia proposed to the Minister of Corrections to add toilets in prison cells to the list of
places that cannot be placed under surveillance. This proposal has not been fulfilled. The
European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) regularly reiterates in its reports,
based on visits to various countries, that it is essential ‘that the privacy of detained persons be preserved when they are using a toilet and washing themselves.’66
The Special Preventive Group visiting penitentiary establishments revealed that prisoners’
right to private life is not respected in establishment no. 6. In particular, in the majority
of cells, visual surveillance systems (video cameras) are installed so that toilet areas are
within the camera’s scope. The Special Preventive Group therefore concluded that inmates’ privacy was not respected in the establishment.
The European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) has numerously emphasised
the importance of reasoning standards of the decisions about surveillance and control
through visual and/or electronic means. The Committee has repeatedly pointed out that
the use of surveillance without adequate reasoning can amount to violation of an inmate’s right to private life.67
Furthermore, the Public Defender observed in the Parliamentary Report of 2015 that,
to provide prisoners with sufficient legal safeguards, it was necessary to indicate in surveillance orders those facts and circumstances that warranted the surveillance measure
in each particular case. The reason as to why other measures are considered to be ineffective should also be indicated in those orders. In each individual case, risks should
be assessed in detail and the decisions about surveillance should clearly show that such
measure is the last resort. It should be noted with regret that this recommendation has
not been fulfilled.
The outcomes of the inspection of penitentiary establishments carried out by the Special Preventive Group in 2016, similar to those in 2015, showed that decisions ordering
surveillance contain scarce information and the wording is stereotypical. This issue is discussed in detail in the 2015 Parliamentary Report of the Public Defender of Georgia.68
Apart from the reasoning standards of decisions ordering surveillance through visual and/
or electronic means, it is also important to have these decisions periodically reviewed.
Under Rule 51.1 of the European Prison Rules, ‘the security measures applied to individual prisoners shall be the minimum necessary to achieve their secure custody.’ Under Rule
51.4, ‘each prisoner shall then be held in security conditions appropriate to these levels of
risk.’ Under Rule 51.5, ‘the level of security necessary shall be reviewed at regular intervals throughout a person’s imprisonment.’
66
67
68
See” http://www.cpt.coe.int/documents/hun/2010-16-inf-eng.pdf p. 19, para. 31, also: http://www.cpt.
coe.int/documents/ita/2013-32-inf-eng.pdf p. 30, para. 60 [Last visited on 12.03.2017].
Report to the Ukrainian Government on the visit to Ukraine carried out by the European Committee for the
Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) from 1 to 10 December
2012, para. 52, available in English at: http://www.cpt.coe.int/documents/ukr/2013-23-inf-eng.htm [Last
visited on 12.03.2017].
The Report of the Public Defender of Georgia of 2015 on the Situation of Protection of Human Rights in
Georgia, p. 46.
NATIONAL PREVENTIVE MECHANISM (NPM), 2016
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