A complaint by Montenegro’s Human Rights Action, prompted by leaked preliminary findings linked to the Council of Europe’s anti-torture committee, has put the Special Psychiatric Hospital in Dobrota back under scrutiny. Beyond denouncing alleged degrading conditions, the controversy is sharpening a wider European argument: that preventing abuse in closed psychiatric settings requires a rights-based shift away from institutionalisation toward community support, peer-led services, and independent safeguards.
An NGO complaint and a European watchdog’s shadow
On 28 January 2026, the Montenegrin watchdog Human Rights Action (HRA) issued a public complaint after what it described as leaked preliminary findings from the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT), a Council of Europe body that inspects places where people are deprived of liberty.
HRA said the leaked material—reported by the newspaper Vijesti—raised serious concerns about long-standing problems in closed institutions, including the Special Psychiatric Hospital in Dobrota. The watchdog’s central demand is transparency: publish the relevant CPT documentation and set out clear, public steps to prevent abuse and protect patients’ rights.
What is being alleged
The information currently in the public domain points to a familiar risk pattern in closed settings: overcrowding, poor living conditions, and the potential for neglect and degrading treatment when oversight is weak and people have limited ability to complain safely. Vijesti quoted Dobrota’s management disputing parts of the picture, while acknowledging operational pressures and referencing a “court hospital” solution—an approach that critics argue can reinforce reliance on institutional pathways rather than reduce them.
Because the CPT’s full report has not been officially published in this case, the public discussion is built on partial reporting and civil-society statements. Still, HRA’s message is unambiguous: when credible concerns arise in a closed psychiatric institution, secrecy is itself part of the problem, and independent scrutiny becomes urgent.
Why rights advocates say “reform inside” is not enough
Across Europe, allegations of abuse in psychiatric and forensic facilities repeatedly raise the same question: can closed institutions ever be made reliably safe for those inside them, or do they structurally generate risk? Disability-rights advocates increasingly point to the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD Committee) General Comment No. 5 on Article 19 (“living independently and being included in the community”), which stresses choice, autonomy, and access to community support as prerequisites for full rights.
In its 2022 Guidelines on deinstitutionalization, including in emergencies, the CRPD Committee sets out how states should plan and deliver a transition away from institutions—building community-based supports and preventing new forms of segregation from replacing old ones. For many rights groups, the Dobrota controversy is therefore not only about conditions inside one hospital; it is about whether governments are willing to reduce and ultimately end dependence on institutional models that place people at heightened vulnerability.
Accountability first: what transparency would look like
HRA’s position is that credibility requires publication and follow-through. That means, at minimum, authorising disclosure of the relevant CPT findings (once finalised), answering publicly to any identified shortcomings, and enabling independent monitoring mechanisms to assess the situation on the ground. Where allegations indicate possible criminal conduct, rights groups argue that the response must include independent investigation and, if warranted, prosecution—because administrative “lessons learned” alone rarely deter repeat harm.
A broader European debate on coercion and safeguards
The Dobrota case lands amid an intensifying Europe-wide debate about coercion, safeguards, and alternatives. Advocacy networks have highlighted growing institutional resistance to approaches they view as incompatible with the CRPD’s direction, including proposals that could normalise coercive frameworks rather than reduce them. Within that wider landscape, previous reporting on The European Times has tracked how legal challenges and policy shifts are reshaping arguments over forced treatment and rights protections.
What to watch next
Three developments will determine whether this complaint leads to meaningful protection from abuse.
- Transparency: whether Montenegro permits publication of the full CPT report and responds publicly, in detail, to any findings.
- Independent accountability: whether credible allegations are investigated by bodies that are institutionally independent from the facility and the health authorities.
- CRPD-aligned transition: whether authorities adopt a measurable plan to reduce reliance on closed psychiatric institutions by shifting support toward community-based, voluntary, human-rights-centred services, including peer-led supports, independent advocacy, and protections that prevent coercion and segregation.
Until full documentation is published, the responsible conclusion is necessarily cautious. But the stakes are not: closed institutions concentrate vulnerability. If the aim is to prevent abuse—not merely respond after harm occurs—then transparency, independent safeguards, and a credible pathway away from institutionalisation are the measures that rights advocates say matter most.
