Meeting of the Slovenian and Hungarian National Preventive Mechanisms

Commissioner for Fundamental Rights László Székely, who fulfills the role of the Hungarian National Preventive Mechanism (NPM) and his Slovenian partner, Slovenian Deputy Ombudsman Ivan Šelih, fulfilling the responsibilities of the Slovenian NPM, as well as NPM representative Robert Gačnik paid a visit to the Zala County Remand Prison on November 13-14, 2018, where they met with acting Prison Commander Colonel István András Fülöp, and Lieutenant-Colonel Szabolcs Porubszky.

The two experts heading the OPCAT NPM Department Mr. Gergely Fliegauf and Ms. Katalin Haraszti, as well as head of department at the Office of the Commissioner for Fundamental Rights Ms. Erika Pajcsics-Csóré accompanied the guests to this visit.

By way of introduction, acting Prison Commander István András Fülöp gave a detailed presentation of the key data of the remand prison, its everyday tasks, as well as its challenges and achievements. Then the guests had the chance to visit the exercise area, the dormitories of the inmates, their workshops, the kitchen and the health care section. During the visit, the Hungarian NPM also described the practice of conducting personal interviews, the experts accompanying the Commissioner conducted some research measurements in one of the cells, and then they shared their on-site experience and observations with the heads of the institution.