A United Nations human rights group arrived in Italy on Monday for a two-week fact-finding mission into the country's detention policies.
The UN's Working Group on Arbitrary Detention will tour Italy until November 14, visiting Rome, Naples, Milan and the three Sicilian towns of Caltanissetta, Cassibile and Pozzallo.
Two of the group's five independent experts, Roberto Garreton of Chile and Aslan Abashidze of Russia, will examine Italy's legislation and study the reality of detention practice in a variety of contexts.
The purpose of the visit is ''to talk with the relevant authorities at the executive, judicial and local levels as well as with civil society and detainees themselves,'' explained a statement by the UN.
The representatives will visit prisons, young offenders' centres, psychiatric institutes, police stations and immigration holding facilities.
The group will hold a press conference at the end of its visit but will not decide whether to issue an official report until the end of the month.
Although the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has not issued a report on Italy since its creation 17 years ago, the country's detention policies have come under fire from other quarters in recent years.
One of the chief concerns, which has been the subject of more than one judgment by the European Court of Human Rights, is the length of time criminal proceedings take.
Defendants sometimes wait years for a final sentence and during this time, they are often held in mainstream prisons alongside convicted inmates.
A recent report by Italy's prisoner campaign group, Antigone, revealed that that 55% of the country's inmates are either still awaiting trial or a final sentence. This was more than double the European average, which is just under 25%.
Another issue raised by critics is the conditions in which migrants are held.
Foreigners who arrive in Italy without official identification or those who avoid immigration controls are sent immediately to holding centres dotted around the country.
A string of disturbing reports from human rights groups recounting violence, poor medical care and a lack of access to legal channels has prompted efforts by two successive governments to improve the situation but some concerns remain.
The Working Group on Arbitrary Detention was established in 1991 by the Commission on Human Rights, since replaced by the Human Rights Council.
It is tasked with investigating cases in which people are deprived of their liberty arbitrarily or inconsistently with international human rights standards, such as the right to a fair trial.
In recent months the group has also visited Angola, Colombia, Equatorial Guinea, Mauritania, Norway and Ukraine.
