On 31 August 2015, together with the employees of the Office of the Public Defender of Rights and interpreters, the Defender visited the Facility For Detention of Foreigners in Bělá-Jezová. After inspecting the premises, interviewing the detained foreign nationals and the staff, the Defender concluded that the situation amounted to an acute humanitarian problem. The facility’s standard capacity of 270 beds was increased to 700 and housed 659 persons, including 147 children. The Facility was not prepared, in terms of its equipment, organisation and personnel, to accommodate and provide services to such a large number of persons.

The detainees lacked even the most elementary information concerning their situation. Close as well as more distant family members were commonly being separated, both within the Facility itself and when some family members were being transferred into a different facility of the same kind. The anxiety of the detainees was intensified by the fact that they were unable to contact their relatives. The detainees felt utterly humiliated by the conditions of detention and the treatment they were subjected to. Parents felt humiliated in front of their children, not least because they were escorted in handcuffs by police officers. The Defender also drew attention to the lack of legal advice provided in the facility and a number of other shortcomings.

At the conclusion of the visit, the Defender informed the head of the Facility of the most significant of her findings and requested that remedy be ensured (providing clothes and shoes, providing the detainees housed in the gym with direct access to the toilet and running water, properly informing and feeding the detainees, enabling the detainees housed in the gym to do shopping, outings, and adopting measures to prevent outbreaks of diarrhoea, etc.).

In the report on visit to the Facility, the Defender described in detail the shortcomings found and concluded that ill-treatment of detainees, especially children, had occurred. The Defender sent the report on the visit to all entities participating in the operation of the Facility (Refugee Facilities Administration of the Ministry of the Interior, the Healthcare Facility of the Ministry of the Interior, the Police of the Czech Republic – Directorate of the Foreigners Police). She requested that the above-specified entities immediately adopt measures to remedy the shortcomings found and inform her of the measures adopted within 14 days. Pursuant to the Public Defender of Rights Act, the Defender also informed the Minister of the Interior, Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, Minister of Education, Youth and Sports, Minister of Justice and Minister for Human Rights of the results of her visit.

The Defender only received a response from the Healthcare Facility of the Ministry of the Interior within the set deadline. Therefore, she decided to carry out an inspection visit in the Facility a month after the initial visit. At the time of the inspection visit (3 October 2015), the Facility housed 397 persons, including 100 children. Despite certain improvements, the Defender again found continuing ill-treatment of the detainees. This is why she contacted the Minister of the Interior and informed the public pursuant to Section 20 (2)(a) and (b) of the Public Defender of Rights Act. The report on the inspection visit to the Facility, including her recommendations for the Ministry of the Interior and the subsequent communication with the relevant entities is available on the Public Defender of Rights’ website.

On 20 October 2015, the Defender personally met with the Minister of the Interior, who informed her that he was adopting measures (increasing the number of social worker, providing for interpreters, games for children, etc.) ensuring that the conditions in the Facility For Detention of Foreigners in Bělá-Jezová were gradually improving, especially with regard to the children accommodated in the Facility.

The Defender became aware of the case of significant modifications of the façade of “U Zlaté koule” building (situated in Olomouc) thanks to a news report published by an on-line daily. The publicly available information suggested that the Construction Code may have been breached since the construction modifications of the street-facing façade had altered the appearance of the building without this being permitted by the competent construction authority. In this case, the authority competent to ensure compliance with the duties under the Construction Code was the Olomouc City Hall (hereinafter the “Construction Authority”). Taking the above facts into consideration, the Defender initiated inquiry into the case on her own initiative.

Over the course of the inquiry, the Construction Authority informed the Defender that in the given case, construction modifications resulting in a change of the building’s appearance were carried out. Therefore, one of the conditions pursuant to Section 103 (1)(d) of the Construction Code was not met and the construction modification thus required a construction permit. In assessing the change of appearance of the structure, the Construction Authority based its deliberations on the fact that the original façade had been richly decorated with façade elements and the new façade lacked any differentiation, in other words the change of the façade’s appearance was obvious. Given the above-described facts, the Construction Authority advised the Defender that it would initiate proceedings ex officio to remove the unauthorised construction modifications.

Taking into consideration that the Construction Authority had already carried out remedial measures consisting in the initiation of proceedings aimed at removal of the unauthorised construction modification of the “U Zlaté koule” building in the course of the inquiry, the Defender decided to close the inquiry. Nevertheless, she reserved the right to monitor the Construction Authority’s further procedure in this case.