“Article 12 (e) of the enabling law (Law No. 26/2014 with 2016 amendments) provides that the NIHRB has the competence “to monitor violation of human rights, conduct the necessary investigation, and draw the attention of the competent authorities”.

The NIHRB’s submits that its mandate to investigate allegations of torture and ill-treatment is limited and that it has followed up on complaints and reports from NGOs and UN special procedures by referring such matters to relevant authorities.

The SCA recalls its previous observation that NIHRB had not provided adequate information on measures it took to address serious human rights violations including torture and arbitrary detention.

The SCA refers to A.2 of the Paris Principles which provides that “a national institution shall be given as broad a mandate as possible” and G.O. 1.2 on ‘Human rights mandate’ which states that “the NHRI’s mandate […] must be defined as broadly as possible so as to give the public the protection of a wide range of international human rights standards.

The SCA recommends for NIHRB to interpret and implement its mandate broadly to independently investigate all human rights violations including violations committed in places of deprivation of liberty by the military, police, and security officers.”

“