Publication highlights Introduction 47. Twenty-three CPT visit reports were published during the 17-month period covered by this General Report, confrming once again the well-established trend of states deciding to lift the veil of confdentiality and place the Committee’s fndings in the public domain. At the time of writing, 317 of the 363 reports drawn up so far have been published. A state-by-state table showing the current situation as regards publication of CPT visit reports is set out in Appendix 6. 48. Special mention should be made of the publication of the report on the CPT’s 2012 periodic visit to the Russian Federation. This publication, in December 2013, follows that in January 2013 of the report on the CPT’s visit to the North Caucasian region in April/May 2011. The Committee is keen to pursue its work in the Federation, through both close co-operation with the Russian authorities and informed dialogue with all the other relevant interlocutors. Obviously, the publication of the CPT’s reports greatly facilitates this process. A recent example was the round table organised by the Russian authorities in Moscow on 24 September 2014, which focused on the implementation by the Russian authorities of the recommendations made by the CPT in the past, and, in particular, in the two aforementioned visit reports (see also paragraphs 84 to 88). The Committee trusts that this positive development marks the beginning of a new policy of the Russian Federation and that further publications, such as the report and response on the July 2013 visit, will follow shortly. 49. The CPT also hopes that the clear message given by the Committee of Ministers in February 2002, encouraging “all Parties to the Convention to authorise publication, at the earliest opportunity, of all CPT visit reports and of their responses”, will be heeded by the Azerbaijani authorities. So far, only two out of the eight reports on the CPT’s visits to Azerbaijan have been made public. In particular, publication of the report on the Committee’s most recent periodic visit to Azerbaijan, in 2011, as well as of the reports on the ad hoc visits in 2012 and 2013, would be a very positive step. 50. In November 2014, the Ukrainian authorities informed the CPT of their decision taken in July 2014 to authorise in advance the automatic publication of all future preliminary observations on visits, visit reports and related government responses, unless they decide in a given case to postpone publication for a period of up to six months. As the CPT has repeatedly emphasised, authorising publication of documents related to visits can be seen as an important means of co-operating with the Committee. The CPT therefore welcomes the above-mentioned decision by the Ukrainian authorities, and invites other states to follow this example of introducing an automatic publication procedure.7 7. A similar request for “automatic publication” had been made by the Moldovan authorities in 2010 (cf. the CPT’s 21st General Report, CPT/Inf (2011) 28, paragraph 27). ► Page 25