E/CN.4/2005/85/Add.3 page 15 57. In September 2002, Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) Italy initiated a medical assistance programme for immigrants and asylum-seekers in the Lampedusa CPTA, where it looked after some 7,000 people per year. In April 2004, the Ministry of the Interior officially informed MSF that the agreement which until then had given the organization access to the CPTAs was not to be renewed. The Ministry’s decision was taken two and a half months after the publication by MSF of its report Rapporto sui centri di permanenza temporanea e assistenza.19 Since then, MSF had repeatedly requested a meeting with the head of the Department of Civil Liberties and Immigration at the Ministry of the Interior, who is responsible for the coordination of the CPTAs and the identification centres. The Special Rapporteur put in a plea for MSF during her visit and a meeting between the organization and the Ministry of the Interior finally took place at the end of June. After that meeting, the Ministry of the Interior brokered the signing of a protocol between the Prefect of Agrigento, the Cofradía de la Misericordia and MSF on the coordination of medical assistance during mass landings in Lampedusa. 58. The staff of the Lampedusa CPTA reported that to date 20 applications for asylum had been submitted from the Centre in 2004. Representatives of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and CIR apparently visited Lampedusa in 2003. 59. In Rome, the Special Rapporteur met members of the working group on CPTAs composed of members of Parliament, senators and representatives of NGOs. The group is preparing a White Paper on alleged violations of the rights of immigrants held in these centres and considers that discussion is needed about the centres and possible alternatives. It expressed concern at the increase of the maximum period of administrative detention in the CPTAs and the presence of ex-convicts who, after serving sentence in Italian prisons, were taken to the CPTAs for subsequent deportation. The group also commented that the codes of conduct of the CPTAs were not known, and expressed reservations about the private management of the centres. It decried the restrictions on access to CPTA facilities.20 Identification centres 60. According to the Ministry of the Interior, the identification centres for which article 32 of Act No. 189/2002 provides have not yet been established, since the implementing regulations have not been approved. The Special Rapporteur nevertheless visited the Salinagrande centre in Trapani, inaugurated in July 2003, which according to the official agenda was an identification centre.21 61. According to the Ministry of the Interior, Act No. 189/2002 provides that its regulations will establish the regime applicable to asylum-seekers, who will in the future have to wait in these identification centres for a decision on their applications. The Special Rapporteur was informed that the Salinagrande centre held persons who had applied for asylum after arriving on Lampedusa, although it also took in immigrants when the island’s CPTA exceeded its maximum capacity.