E/CN.4/2006/6/Add.6 page 30 30 Pursuant to article 60 of the CPL, authorities may formally arrest a suspect “when there is evidence to support the facts of a crime and the criminal suspect or defendant could be sentenced to a sanction of not less than imprisonment, and if such measures as allowing him to obtain a guarantor pending trial or placing him under residential surveillance would be insufficient to prevent the occurrence of danger to society”. According to article 59 of the CPL, “arrests of criminal suspects or defendants shall be subject to approval by a People’s Procuratorate or decision by a People’s Court and shall be executed by a public security organ”. 31 According to the CPL, the basic time limit for holding a suspect in detention after formal arrest and before trial is two months. In ‘complex’ cases, this period may be extended by one month, for a total period of three months (article 124). Under certain conditions involving ‘major’ or ‘complex’ cases, the initial three month period may be extended for another two months (article 126). If the case involves a crime where the punishment is fixed-term imprisonment of ten years or greater, a second two month extension of the investigation period is permitted (article 127). Thus, once the procuratorate has approved a formal arrest, a suspect may be held for up to a total of seven months in investigative detention. 32 In addition, where the police find evidence of ‘other major crimes’ during the investigation (article 128) the investigative period for these alleged new crimes will begin on their ‘discovery’. This means that the suspect may be held in pretrial detention for another seven months. There does not appear to be any limit on the number of times this “new crimes” exception may be invoked. 33 After the investigation period expires, the police must submit a recommendation for prosecution to the procuratorate. The procuratorate has one month to examine the recommendation for prosecution (article 138). In “major” or “complex” cases, this examination period may be extended for up to another two weeks, for a total of one and one-half months (article 138). This period may be further extended if a ‘supplementary investigation’ is deemed necessary. The procuratorate may request that the police conduct a supplementary investigation of up to 1 month. After the 1 month supplementary investigation period, the time the procuratorate has to examine the case for prosecution is reset, meaning the procuratorate has up to an additional 1½ months after the end of the supplementary investigation to decide whether to prosecute (article 140). The procuratorate may request up to two supplementary investigations. So, if two supplementary investigations are requested and the procuratorate takes the maximum period to evaluate the case after each supplementary investigation, the suspect could be held in detention for a total of an additional 6½ months after the initial post-arrest investigative detention period has ended and before an indictment is issued. 34 The Special Rapporteur has been informed of the following developments: “in May 2003, the Supreme People’s Procuratorate initiated a special nationwide campaign and by July 2003 no cases of extended custody in the procuratorial sector had been reported. Procuratorial agencies also pressed other law enforcement agencies to initiate clearing-up work, issuing 274,219 procuratorial rectification opinions that year that resulted in rectification for 25,736 individuals. In May 2004, the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, along with the Supreme People’s Court and the Ministry of Public Security jointly issued a “Notice on Strictly Enforcing the Criminal Procedure Code and Conscientiously Rectifying and Preventing