CAT/C/44/2* competent authorities of two of the countries visited have responded promptly – a clear signal of their willingness to cooperate with the Subcommittee. C. Publication of the visit reports of the Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture 30. At the time of writing, of the seven visit reports issued to date, only those on Honduras, the Maldives and Sweden, along with the authorities’ responses in the case of Sweden, were in the public domain. The Subcommittee hopes that in due course the authorities of every State party visited will request that the visit report and the authorities’ response to it should be published. Until such time the visit reports remain confidential. 31. Even though the majority of the Subcommittee’s reports are still confidential, the following recommendations from those that have been published are summarized below as they may be useful for other States in the area of prevention of torture: • National preventive mechanisms: Guidelines on their establishment, the involvement of civil society, and their mandate, powers and membership. The Subcommittee has strongly emphasized the need for legislation establishing national preventive mechanisms to contain an independent procedure for selecting members. • Legal and institutional framework: On the legal framework, the recommendations include alignment of criminal law with international standards on preventing and combating torture, which generally entails defining torture as an offence in accordance with article 1 of the Convention against Torture, and the establishment of legal safeguards against torture, such as access to a lawyer and a doctor and the exclusion of evidence obtained by torture. On the institutional framework, the recommendations are aimed at strengthening institutions involved in prevention of torture. Specifically, the Subcommittee has recommended an increase in the resources allocated to the public defender system and the judiciary, and has highlighted the important role these institutions play in preventing torture. • Places of deprivation of liberty: With regard to the police, generally speaking the Subcommittee recommends observance and implementation of existing legal safeguards, training in prevention for police personnel and improvement of the material conditions of detention. The Subcommittee has noted with concern that acts of torture and other forms of ill-treatment often take place during the first few hours of detention in police stations, and has therefore emphasized the need for detailed records — giving, for example, the identity of all persons detained, the time of detention and on what grounds — to be kept at police headquarters and for police officials to be trained in their use. With regard to prisons, the recommendations usually refer to the separation of the various categories of prisoners (pretrial/convicted, male/female, minors/adults, in accordance with the relevant international standards), the material conditions in prisons (adequate living space, food and drinking water of adequate quality and in sufficient quantity, etc.) and methods of discipline and punishment, with particular attention to conditions of isolation. Reference is also made to each country’s particular circumstances, for example as regards risk groups such as women, minors, persons with disabilities, indigenous people and Afro-descendants. 32. 10 The Subcommittee will develop these comments in future annual reports. GE.10-41876