A/HRC/16/52 25. On 16 September, the Special Rapporteur, together with 25 other special procedures mandate holders, issued a joint press release on the occasion of the High-Level Summit on the Millennium Development Goals, reiterating that without human rights, the implementation of the Millennium Goals would not be successful. 26. On 20 October, the Special Rapporteur issued a press release on his preliminary observations and conclusions of his mission to Greece. 27. On 4 November, it was announced that Juan E. Méndez had taken up his duties as Special Rapporteur as of 1 November 2010, replacing Manfred Nowak who had served as Special Rapporteur for six years. 28. On 11 November, the Special Rapporteur issued a joint press release with five other experts concerning the brutal human rights violations in Somalia, where civilians are the victims of executions, torture, stoning, decapitation, amputation and floggings carried out by insurgents. 29. On 9 December, the Special Rapporteur issued a joint statement on International Human Rights Day through the International Coordinating Committee. F. Follow-up mission to the Republic of Kazakhstan 30. The Special Rapporteur conducted a fact-finding mission to Kazakhstan2 from 5 to 13 May 2009 and formulated a number of recommendations to improve the situation of torture and ill-treatment in that country. In April 2010, the Government of Kazakhstan officially invited the Special Rapporteur for a follow-up visit to the country to discuss the implementation of his recommendations with the Government, civil society organizations and the Central Asia Regional Office of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). 31. Over the past six years, the Special Rapporteur has only been able to carry out limited follow-up of his missions. The official practice is to send questionnaires to Governments and civil society organizations in the respective States requesting information on the measures taken since the Special Rapporteur’s last visit. The information is then incorporated into a follow-up report that is published annually. However, with the exception of a follow-up visit to Moldova in September 2009, which focused specifically on the National Preventive Mechanism (NPM), the Special Rapporteur is rarely officially invited by Governments to revisit their country to discuss the implementation of his recommendations. Consequently, the Special Rapporteur commends the Government of Kazakhstan for its official invitation to pay a follow-up visit, which indicates a serious commitment to combating torture and improving the conditions of detention, and constitutes a best practice example. The Special Rapporteur carried out the follow-up mission3 to Kazakhstan from 29 September to 1 October 2010. 32. The Special Rapporteur was impressed by the wide range of measures taken by the Government to improve the situation of torture and ill-treatment in the country since his initial visit. He acknowledged the statement by the Deputy General Prosecutor which highlights Kazakhstan’s commitment to a policy of zero tolerance of torture, and welcomed the Action Plan for 2010-2012 that was launched in February 2010 to implement the concluding observations and recommendations formulated by the Committee against 2 3 See A/HRC/13/39/Add.3. See A/HRC/16/52/Add.2 for a detailed report on the follow-up country visit to Kazakhstan. 7