A refusal to grant a partner visa by the Department of Immigration and Citizenship has been overturned following an Ombudsman investigation.

There are too many people being detained at the Christmas Island immigration detention facilities. This is the underlying message in the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s report based on observations during two years of periodic inspection visits.

The Victorian Ombudsman, Mr George Brouwer, tabled in Parliament a report titled "Whistleblowers Protection Act 2001 – Investigation into the failure of agencies to manage registered sex offenders " on 9 February 2011.

After Senegal and Mali, the new Ombudsman of the Republic of Guinea, General Facinet Toure, visited the Office of the Ombudsman in Burkina Faso for three days from 8 to 10 February 2011.

Homelessness represents a very severe form of poverty and social exclusion and is a violation of fundamental human rights. The report of the European Consensus Conference on Homelessness taking place in Brussels in December 2010 contains the findings of an independent jury.

The Commission for Constitutional Rights and Freedoms under the Ombudsperson of the Republic of Uzbekistan, held an extended session on 4 February 2011 to hear the report of the Ombudsperson's activities in 2010.

In a meeting with the College of Commissioners on 15 February the European Ombudsman, P. Nikiforos Diamandouros, stressed citizens' rights to good administration and openness.

On 28 January 2011, the Croatian Parliament adopted the Law on the Preventive Mechanism for Suppression of Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment and Punishment, by which the Republic of Croatia has fulfilled its obligation after signing the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment and Punishment (OPCAT).