Guidebook might strengthen procedural safeguards and prevent torture and other forms of ill-treatment. NHRIs can be important agents of change to strengthen procedural safeguards. The Paris Principles empower NHRIs to deal with all human rights in the widest sense, including the procedural rights of suspects and accused.5 However, in practice, NHRIs may not have the resources to focus on each and every human right and may need to develop a strategy and prioritise certain rights. As noted by Murray/De Beco, ‘the broader the mandate of the body, the more difficult its task becomes in defining a role and clear strategic direction for its work’.6 Hence, in order to maximise their impact, NHRIs should adopt a strategic approach and reflect on what is the best strategy to improve procedural rights in their national context.7 INTRODUCTION CRPD dispose of a great number of tools that they can use to effectively strengthen procedural rights in all these dimensions, including also their practical application, which is often reported as the main gap and challenge. During the course of the project, some NHRIs, including those with an OPCAT or CRPD mandate, raised doubts as to whether focusing on criminal procedural safeguards would fall within their mandate. We do not think we have to work on this issue because it is already supervised by the prosecutor. We have received complaints a month ago regarding the right to information, but the problem is that we cannot be in the place of the prosecutor (NHRI Representative, Consultation Workshop, Budapest) As noted by UNDP-OHCHR, and given the importance of criminal procedural rights, NHRIs should be especially vigilant regarding their ‘core protection mandate [which] deals with a narrower group of rights associated with civil and political rights of an urgent nature’.8 Within the ‘core protection issues’, are activities relating to the prevention of torture and other forms of ill-treatment, but also more broadly procedural safeguards in criminal proceedings.9 NHRIs are not alone in this task – but share the responsibility with a number of other stakeholders active in the field of criminal justice, including inter alia other domestic human rights bodies, professional associations, practitioners, and civil society organisations. A special strength of NHRIs is that they have a multifunctional mandate that allows them to cover different aspects of the protection and promotion of human rights, spanning from research, training and education, to monitoring visits and complaint handling; from advising the State on the adoption of a new legal instrument to monitoring the practical application of such laws in the domestic context. If well-coordinated with other stakeholders, the mandate of NHRIs can be key to complement, reinforce and follow-up to the work of others. When it comes to procedural rights, the change to be achieved may have various dimensions, including change in the law and policies, change in their practical application, as well as change in the public awareness and culture. NHRIs, especially those with a mandate under the OPCAT and 12 NPMs cannot monitor prosecutors, but institutions only’; ‘NPMs must be there on the spot when the violation happens in practice … if no information is provided to us, we are limited on promoting human rights.10 (NPM Representative, Consultation Workshop, Budapest) However, the research and consultations within the course of this project highlighted that although criminal procedural rights are not among the strategic priorities of NHRIs, almost all NHRIs have worked on them in a way or another. Moreover, while several NHRIs reported using the relevant EU instruments, in some countries NHRIs do not consider a reference to EU instruments on procedural rights of suspects and accused necessary or useful, and prefer to refer to national law or other international standards. Yet there is in certain cases an added value in the application of EU standards that can strengthen the procedural rights of suspects and accused in criminal proceedings (see below, Chapter 1). This Guidebook attempts to offer practical guidance to NHRIs on how to strengthen procedural rights, to address the major issues and concerns according to the views shared by NHRIs and experts during the two-year project, as well as to disseminate good practices and examples from NHRIs in the EU area. 13