A/60/399 are volatile and have the potential to cause conflict. The communications sent to Governments may also contribute to early warning of future problems. 18. The Special Rapporteur believes that the potentialities of the special procedures, in particular certain mandates, should be further developed and lead to the creation of a more formal mechanism that would deal with early warning signs in a more systematic way. III. Communications A. General observations 19. After more than a year of activity, the Special Rapporteur is in a better position to make an assessment of the situation with regard to the right to freedom of religion or belief in the world. 20. Regarding communications, the Special Rapporteur would like to commend the Special Procedures Branch of OHCHR for the creating and maintaining the database on communications sent and received by special procedures. The database provides detailed, complete and, most of all, quickly available information on all aspects of communications. In addition to greatly facilitating the usual monitoring activities of the mandate, it offers the possibility of carrying out more thorough analyses of different types of data (geographical, gender, type of communication, etc.) and will improve the overall quality of the assessments of special procedures. 21. During the period from 1 July 2004 to 30 June 2005, the Special Rapporteur sent a total of 75 communications to 35 countries concerning alleged violations of the right to freedom of religion or belief or other issues of concern to the mandate. The Special Rapporteur is pleased that 25 of these communications were sent jointly with other mandate holders, namely the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, the Special Rapporteur on the question of torture, the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, the Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on human rights defenders, the Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances. The Special Rapporteur has so far received 39 responses from 18 of the States concerned by these communications. 22. The following charts illustrate the percentage of communications sent by type as well as the proportion of responses received from Governments compared to the number of communications sent: 7