A/HRC/23/22 27. The recommendation states: “Requests by members of the armed forces to leave the armed forces for reasons of conscience should be examined within a reasonable time. Pending the examination of their requests they should be transferred to non-combat duties, where possible … No discrimination or prosecution should result from asking to leave the armed forces for reasons of conscience.”26 C. Selective conscientious objection 28. Selective conscientious objection is distinct from an objection to participation in any war, military action, or the armed forces, and accepts the legitimacy of some types of military action. The General Assembly implicitly recognized one type of selective objection in its resolution 33/165, in which it called upon, “Member States to grant asylum or safe transit to another State … to persons compelled to leave their country of nationality solely because of a conscientious objection to assisting in the enforcement of apartheid through service in military or police forces”. D. Decision-making process for applications for conscientious objector status 29. The Commission on Human Rights in its resolution 1998/77 underlined the importance of an independent and impartial decision-making body in the assessment of applications and called “upon States that do not have such a system to establish independent and impartial decision-making bodies with the task of determining whether a conscientious objection is genuinely held in a specific case, taking account of the requirement not to discrimination between conscientious objectors on the basis of the nature of their particular beliefs” (para. 3). In the same resolution, the Commission welcomed “the fact that some States accept claims of conscientious objection as valid without inquiry” (para. 2). 30. In its concluding observations on a State report, the Human Rights Committee requested the State to “consider placing the assessment of applications for conscientious objector status under the control of civilian authorities”.27 While not appearing to require that the assessment process be subject exclusively to a civilian process, the Committee may recommend the use of a civilian process if it appears there is a concern with the independence and impartiality of an existing process. 31. The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe in its Recommendation No. R (87) 8, adopted in 1987 has also underlined the need for a fair procedure. It specifies three requirements: (a) that the examination of applications include all the necessary guarantees for a fair procedures; (b) that an applicant have the right to appeal against the decision of first instance, and (c) that the appeal authority be separate from the military administration and composed so as to ensure its independence. E. Prohibition of repeated trial or punishment of conscientious objectors 32. States that do not recognize conscientious objection have sometimes resorted to repeated trial or imprisonment of conscientious objectors. The Working Group on Arbitrary Detention considers that “repeated incarceration of conscientious objectors is directed 26 27 Ibid., paras. 43, 45. Concluding observations on the initial report of Greece, CCPR/CO/83/GRC, para. 15. 9