Annual report 2011: Spain’s National Preventive Mechanism In presenting this report I look towards the future with the satisfaction of representing one of the few countries in the world that have a consolidated NPM (to gauge from the number of annual reports submitted to the SPT last year there are just fifteen), but also with a sense of duty and responsibility: we have a long road ahead of us in the service of basic rights as we strive to improve the conditions in which persons deprived of liberty are held in our country. Our citizens deserve and require much of us, and there is much that we must offer them. I am sure that the Office of the Ombudsman of Spain will be able to meet this great challenge. M.ª Luisa Cava de Llano y Carrió Acting Ombudsman of Spain 6    THE OMBUDSMAN OF SPAIN