The Irish Council for Civil Liberties ("ICCL") and the Irish Penal Reform Trust ("IPRT") will launch the "Joint Shadow Report to the First Periodic Review of Ireland under the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment" on 20 May 2011 at 11am in Buswell's Hotel (Georgian Suite), 23-25 Molesworth Street, Dublin 2.
To register or for more information, please contact Mary Gaffney at info@iprt.ie or tel: 01-8741400, alternatively please click here to sign up online.
The document is published to "shadow" the official Government report to United Nations Committee Against Torture. Ireland's report will be reviewed before the UN Committee, which takes place in Geneva on 23-24 May 2011. During this process the Government, represented by the Secretary General of the Department of Justice will have to answer questions by the Committee. The Committee itself is composed of ten independent experts who will investigate Ireland's implementation of the rights granted by the UN Convention Against Torture of 1984. The Committee will then issue concluding observations on Ireland's compliance with the treaty provisions. State parties to the treaty are obligated to submit regular reports to the Committee.
The Joint report has been endorsed by 31 Irish NGOs and highlights many human rights issues faced by asylum seekers, prisoners and children. Among the issues included are the doubling of the prison population since 1997, detention conditions within the state and the treatment of asylum seekers.
The shadow report makes a series of key recommendations that an independent prison complaints system be set up; that the imprisonment of children at St. Patrick's Institution be ceased immediately; that the Government put in place a system to investigate deaths that occur in prison and that the placement of mentally ill individuals in Irish prisons cease.