A/HRC/45/49 2. Action taken by the Joint Human Rights Office 25. The Joint Office has continued its monitoring and investigation work in conflictaffected areas. For example, it conducted 37 investigation and monitoring missions in the provinces concerned. It published three reports on the human rights violations and abuses committed in the provinces of Ituri and North Kivu.2 26. Between June and December 2019, the Joint Office conducted five protection missions in preparation for joint investigation missions with the judicial authorities or for mobile court hearings. During the visits, the Joint Office identified and provided information to 229 victims, including 139 men, 59 women, 18 girls and 8 boys, as well as 5 victims of sexual violence (including 2 minors). It provided multifaceted assistance to victims and witnesses of human rights violations in the course of nine joint investigation missions. Thus, 547 victims and witnesses − 300 men, 167 women, 4 boys, 4 girls and 72 victims of sexual violence − received assistance from the Joint Office and protection measures with a view to ensuring their safe participation in trials. 27. The Joint Office continued to provide technical support to human rights organizations through capacity-building workshops on individual protection. For instance, it provided training to 121 people, including 49 women, belonging to protection networks for human rights defenders in the provinces of Ituri, Kasai and Tanganyika. It also held 15 training sessions for 544 people, including 156 women, belonging to civil society organizations, the security and defence forces and the administrative or traditional authorities. 28. During the reporting period, the secretariat responsible for human rights due diligence policy on United Nations support to non-United Nations security forces, placed under the authority of the Joint Office, carried out at least 453 risk assessments. These led to authorization being given for United Nations support − often with measures to mitigate the risk of human rights violations − to 928 State officials, including members of the defence and security forces, especially the armed forces, the police and the prison authorities. 29. As a result of risk mitigation measures, the roll-out of the policy led to significant progress in the fight against impunity, for instance through the establishment of joint committees to monitor cases of human rights violations by the members of the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and officers of the Congolese national police and follow-up of remedial measures taken by the authorities in such cases. C. Sexual violence 30. In its concluding observations on the fourth periodic report of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Human Rights Committee urged the Government to take all necessary measures to ensure that all cases of sexual violence are investigated and that the perpetrators are prosecuted and, if found guilty, punished. The Committee also recommended that physical and psychological support should be provided to victims and that their access to legal services should be facilitated (CCPR/C/COD/CO/4, para. 20). 31. In its concluding observations on the combined sixth and seventh periodic reports of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women called on the State to prosecute all acts of violence against women, to punish the perpetrators and to set up a comprehensive care system for victims (CEDAW/C/COD/CO/6-7, para. 22). 32. In its concluding observations on the second periodic report of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Committee against Torture recommended strengthening the 2 6 On 10 January 2020, the Joint Office published a report on human rights violations and abuses committed between December 2017 and September 2019 in a context of inter-ethnic conflict that resulted in several hundred victims and population displacement in Djugu territory, Ituri Province. The Joint Office published an update on the human rights situation in Ituri Province during the period from October 2019 to April 2020 and a report on human rights violations and abuses committed by combatants of the Allied Democratic Forces and members of the security and defence forces between January 2019 and January 2020. GE.20-11014