A/HRC/13/39/Add.5 exceptions, above all Denmark including Greenland, conditions of detention in many of the facilities I visited can only be qualified as inhuman or degrading. I am not only referring to corporal punishment and other forms of torture and ill-treatment inflicted upon detainees, but I am even more concerned about the structural deprivation of most human rights, mainly the rights to food, water, clothing, health care and a minimum of space, hygiene, privacy and security necessary for a humane and dignified existence. It is the combined deprivation and non-fulfilment of these existential rights which amounts to a systematic practice of inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. For me, the way how a society treats its detainees is one of the best indicators for its human rights culture in general. 231. Many detainees complained that they felt like they were treated worse than animals. Indeed, most human beings would not like their dogs or cats to be treated in the same way that many human beings are treated in detention. They usually belong to the most disadvantaged, discriminated and vulnerable groups in society, such as the poor, minorities, drug addicts or aliens. Within detention facilities, there is usually a strict hierarchy, and those at the bottom of this hierarchy, such as children, the elderly, persons with disabilities and diseases, gays, lesbians, bisexuals and trans-gender persons, suffer double or triple discrimination. 232. Cells in police stations are usually designed to keep criminal suspects for a few hours until they are brought before a judge who shall decide whether they are kept in pretrial detention facilities or released. That is why they are in most cases not equipped with any kind of furniture. In most countries I visited, people in police custody sat or slept on the concrete or mud floor without anything but the clothes they were wearing when arrested. They did not have beds, mattresses or blankets, no toilets apart from a whole or bucket in a corner, no toilet paper, water or food. All too often, these cells were dirty, overcrowded and without adequate light and fresh air. Such conditions might perhaps be tolerable if persons were kept there for no longer than a few hours or one night. In reality however, detainees are locked up in such conditions for many days, weeks or even months, partly in violation of domestic laws, but all too often in conformity with domestic laws which allow for extended periods of police custody under ordinary or emergency legislation. It is beyond doubt that such conditions, even in the absence of physical violence, amount to inhuman and degrading treatment. 233. Police officials often openly claim that it is not their responsibility but rather the task of families to provide detainees with the minimum necessary for a dignified existence or survival. In Equatorial Guinea, for example, the families had to bring bottles with water and plastic bags with food. Since most police lock-ups simply had no toilets, detainees had to use the same bottles to urinate and the plastic bags to defecate. If they had no family in the vicinity, detainees had “bad luck” and were dependent on their fellow-detainees to ensure their survival. Unfortunately, Equatorial Guinea is not the only country where I found such appalling conditions of police custody. 234. Conditions in correctional institutions are usually much better. Convicted prisoners often have their own beds or mattresses, may walk outside their cells during the day, may interact with other prisoners and sometimes engage in meaningful activities, such as work, vocational training, sports and other forms of recreation. Nevertheless, many prisons are severely overcrowded, they lack sufficient staff and financial resources. As a consequence, work, education and recreation are only available for a few privileged prisoners who “cooperate” and/or pay the necessary corruption fees. Often, prison regimes are not aimed at the rehabilitation and reintegration of prisoners into society but follow purely punitive policies. In many post-Soviet countries, for example, long-term prisoners are under a special or strict regime which means that they are locked up in cells most of the time, sometimes even in solitary confinement, as in Mongolia, and family visits are subject to severe restrictions. Solitary confinement and similar forms of deprivation of human contact 62