- 13 Regrettably, despite overwhelming indications to the contrary, the Greek authorities have, to date, consistently refused to consider that ill-treatment is a serious problem in Greece and have not taken the required action. For instance, there is still no competent and adequately resourced police inspectorate, nor is there an effective independent police complaints mechanism, which would lead to allegations of ill-treatment by law enforcement officials being investigated thoroughly and, where appropriate, prosecuted rigorously. The lack of action by the authorities to address this issue in the past means that there are officers working in several Security Departments who appear to act in the clear knowledge that they will not be held to account if they physically ill-treat a detained person. 15. In the course of the 2013 visit, the CPT’s delegation received a great number of detailed, coherent and consistent allegations of physical ill-treatment of persons detained in police and border guard stations by officers of the Hellenic Police force. The allegations concerned mainly kicks, slaps, punches and blows with batons (but also other objects) upon or after apprehension and in particular during questioning by officers belonging to the Security Departments. A number of allegations of verbal abuse and threats by police officers, including of a racist nature, were also heard. The CPT has serious concerns that the infliction of ill-treatment for the purposes of trying to obtain a confession is a frequent practice by officers of the Security Departments in various police directorates visited. In particular, the delegation received multiple allegations - from persons interviewed separately - of physical ill-treatment in respect of officers at the Security Police Departments of Kypseli and Omonia Police Stations in Athens and at the Monasteriou Police Headquarters in Thessaloniki, when detaining and interviewing criminal suspects. For example: i. as regards Kypseli Police Station, the delegation met several persons in the first floor holding cell who claimed that crime investigators had repeatedly taken them to the toilet area on that floor and subjected them to slaps, kicks and blows with an extendable baton. During a followup visit two days later, the CPT’s delegation returned to that holding cell and met a recently detained foreign national who described in detail how he had been subjected to similar treatment in the toilet area; he displayed an abrasion to the skin on the inner side of his right shin and an elongated bluish bruise on the right thigh, consistent with his allegation of having been hit with a baton on that part of the body. Another person described being subjected to punches, kicks and baton blows by crime inspectors on the third floor of the Kypseli Police Station following his transfer to that establishment on 8 February 2013; he claimed that when he made a complaint to the prosecutor, he was informed that the police officers alleged that he had initially attacked them. A further person said that on 9 February 2013 he had been taken to the first floor of the station where two officers had told him to undress, after which they subjected him to punches, kicks and baton blows, and that he was only returned to the basement cells two days later. Several persons held in the cells in the basement of the station stated that they had been slapped, punched and kicked by officers after asking for a doctor or for the cell door to be unlocked in order to access the toilet.