the definition of “detention places” in OPCAT by presenting a closed exhaustive list of categories of institutions was deemed to be improper. Such an approach would have inevitably resulted in the creation of a visit system with a too restricted and too restrictive scope of application. However, certain categories fall under the definition of “detention places” provided by OPCAT and could be expressed through a non-exhaustive definition in national legislation, for clarity reasons, such as: • police departments; • preventive arrest; • prisons; • juvenile detention centres;• border police and transit areas at border crossing points, harbours and international airports; • detention centres for immigrants and asylum applicants; • psychiatric institutions; • detention centres under military jurisdiction; • means of transport for the transfer of prisoners. Additionally to these quite obvious categories, according to article 4, NPM should have access to any other place where someone can be kept against his/her own will, even indirectly connected to public authority. Two key phrases in the definition of “detention place” in the meaning of article 4 describe the nature of this connection: • “under its jurisdiction and control”; • “by virtue of an order issued by a public authority or upon its request or with its consent or approval” (regarding the means by which a person is or can be kept in a detention place). SPT considers that, regarding the implementation of this definition in operational practice, it would be desirable “to provide a more extended interpretation to this definition, so as to increase the impact of the preventive activities of NPMs”. “Any place where a person is deprived from freedom (i.e. s/he is not free to leave it at his/her own will) or where (...) a person could be deprived from freedom, s/he should fall under the jurisdiction of the OPCAT mandate if it is a situation where the state exercises or could exercise a regulatory function”. Based on art. 34 of Law no. 35/1997 on the organization and operation of the People’s Advocate Institution, republished: a detention place is any place where persons are deprived from freedom based on a decision of an authority, upon its request or with its explicit or tacit approval. 34