20 years of the CPT 20 years of the CPT 1. The European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment is about to turn twenty. Rather than being a cause for celebration, the Committee sees this as a time for taking stock. What has been achieved during the two decades since the CPT held its inaugural meeting in November 1989, and what challenges lie ahead? 2. One thing which has certainly changed over those twenty years is the geographical scope of the CPT’s field of operations. At that first meeting in November 1989, members elected in respect of the then 15 Parties to the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (ECPT) gathered to plot the course of the Committee’s on-site monitoring action. The number of Parties to the Convention has subsequently more than tripled and now stands at 47 (see Table 1). This is in large measure a consequence of the gradual accession of central and eastern European States to the Council of Europe. The process of ratification of the ECPT by these countries began in 1994 and was basically completed ten years later. As a result, the CPT is presently tasked with preventing torture and other forms of severe illtreatment throughout almost the whole of Europe (and in fact also a significant part of Asia). Table 1. Number of Parties to the ECPT, 1989-2009 3. However, the CPT’s coverage of the European continent is not yet complete. The fact that Belarus is not a Party to the ECPT constitutes one significant lacuna, as the map of the Committee’s field of operations provided in Appendix 3 (page 55) illustrates only too well. Since March 2002, it has been possible for the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe to invite any non-member State to accede to the Convention, and the CPT hopes that the time will soon be ripe for such an invitation to be extended to Belarus. 7