A/HRC/31/48 involved in Ebola virus eradication efforts. They all claim to have been subjected to ill-treatment during their arrest, 21 of them at the hands of gendarmes and 11 by police officers. C. Right to freedom and security 24. Between January and November 2015, staff of the country office conducted 182 visits to places of detention (prisons, police and gendarmerie stations) during which they observed many cases of arbitrary arrest, extended unlawful detention and continued detention of persons who had served their sentence. 25. Since its establishment in Guinea in 2010, the country office has encountered a widespread form of violation of the right to freedom and security whereby mass arrests are carried out during political and social turmoil and persons suspected of criminal offences are held beyond the statutory limit on police custody in order to extract payment from relatives for their release. 26. In June 2015 alone, the country office recorded 36 cases where t he 48-hour statutory limit on police custody was exceeded. 27. In September 2015, staff of the country office visited the urban police station of Enco 5 in the Ratoma district of Conakry, where they met suspects from whom the superintendent had allegedly demanded the payment of a sum of money in return for keeping their cases from going to the public prosecution service. Questioned by the country office regarding the lawfulness of this demand, the detective claimed to have the right to issue “police fines” to suspects. The country office brought the case to the attention of the competent prosecution service. Staff of the country office noted the prevalence of this practice at many police custody facilities, in Conakry and the interior of the country alike, such as the gendarmerie station in Sougueta in the administrative region of Kindia. 28. In August 2015, in Beyla, Guinée Forestière, 12 individuals remained in prison for five weeks despite the fact that the gendarme responsible for investigating their case had declared that they had not committed any offence. 29. In Conakry, at the central police station of Matoto and gendarmerie mobile unit No. 2 in the Hamdallaye neighbourhood of Ratoma, staff of the country office met two young men, one who had been arrested for impregnating a woman and the other for having a verbal altercation with a police officer. In the latter case, the police officer had handed the victim over to the gendarmerie for “disrespecting him”. The young man had remained locked up for two days. Both victims were released after the country office argued in their favour. D. Right to participate 30. Notwithstanding the political violence that marred the pre -election period, in particular during protests organized by the opposition, all of the national and international observers noted that the presidential election took place under free and transparent conditions. Candidates were allowed freely to stand for election, travel, campaign and present their platforms. 31. However, the human rights observers trained by the country office who were deployed to all regions of the country noted anomalies and irregularities that hindered the right to vote, one of the major components of the right to participate. In the four administrative regions, thousands of citizens complained of not being able to enter their names in the electoral lists because there were no enumerators in their towns. 6/15 GE.16-00828