Today in Interfax Information Agency Mr. Ig or Kalyapin, chairman of INGO “Committee against Torture” told journalists about the organization’s work from the moment of its creation nine years ago. The Committee’s chairman focused his presentation around ineffective operation of the investigation authorities and Prosecutor’s Office that do everything to delay investigations into the allegations of torture and cruel treatment by law enforcement agents. 

Only in the last three years, from 2006 till 2009 and only under cases in procedure of the Committee against Torture, the investigation authorities issued more than two hundred fifty refusals to instigate criminal proceedings under citizen’s applications claiming police abuse. All of the refusals were cancelled as unlawful.

It is quite common that investigators issue several dozens of unlawful and ill-founded procedural decisions under one case thus basically ignoring the case and breaching the state’s positive obligation to ensure citizens’ rights to an effective investigation of torture cases.

The violations committed by the prosecutor’s office and investigation bodies are a structural problem, and within 9 years of the CAT’s operation the situation has not improved. 

Another serious problem is that heads of law enforcement agencies are not held responsible for actions of their subordinates even in cases when certain agents are convicted for tortures or cruel treatment.

Not a single high-standing police official, or investigation or prosecutorial agency head has been brought to liability for crimes committed by his subordinates.