Police offers to set up regional human rights office

POLICE proposals to establish a regional human rights protection office have been positively received by a conference in Strasbourg.

The proposals to set up an Eastern Mediterranean office and have it manned by Council of Europe experts was made by a police delegation to Strasbourg, headed by police chief Panicos Hadjiloizou.

They were submitted during a four-day conference on ‘Police and Human Rights 1997-2000’ organised by the Council of Europe last week.

A police announcement said yesterday that the proposals would be examined and decided upon by the Council of Europe as soon as possible.

Police are also hoping that their suggestion to make short films on human rights in Cyprus for the global market will also come to fruition.

Four years ago, a report by the Council of Europe Committee for the Prevention of Torture concluded “that persons held in certain police establishments in Cyprus – and particularly in Limassol Town Police Station – run the serious risk of severe ill treatment/torture.”

The report came after the committee visited Cyprus in 1992 and received complaints by detainees.

Following the committee’s findings, the government launched its own independent inquiry into police torture which also alleged that abuse of citizens had taken place in Limassol.

However, three high-ranking officers alleged to have orchestrated torture at Limassol police station were cleared for lack of evidence by a criminal court and had their subsequent sackings overturned by the Supreme Court

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