[JURIST] At the 13th UN Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice [official website] on Thursday, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) [official website] announced [press release] that prison overcrowding has reached “epidemic proportions” worldwide. “Prison overcrowding can also be considered as a symptom of a malfunctioning justice system, and the problems of overcrowding have to be dealt with by the prison administration, although the solutions are seldom within their reach,” said Piera Barzano, Senior Regional Advisor of the Justice Section at UNODC. “Prison overcrowding impacts the quality of nutrition, sanitation, prisoner-activities, health care services and the care of vulnerable groups. It affects the physical, mental health and well-being of all prisoners. It generates prisoner tension, violence, exacerbates existing mental and physical health problems.” Overcrowding refers to prisons where the number of prisoners exceeds the prison’s official capacity. According to the UNODC, there are over 10 million people imprisoned across the globe. Last year, 77 countries had a prisoner occupancy rate higher than 120 per cent, and some had a rate as high as 400 per cent. Ms. Barzano indicated that UNODC has worked with the Red Cross to publish a handbook containing strategies to reduce overcrowding in prisons. Miroslawa Czerna of the International Committee of the Red Cross [advocacy website] shared Barzano’s outrage at many prison conditions, and recognized overcrowding as “a very serious humanitarian concern as it generates substandard and inhumane conditions.”

In July, the French Senate adopted a measure [JURIST report] in an attempt to reduce prison overcrowding. In August 2013 the Italian Senate approved a measure [JURIST report] to ease some of the worst prison overcrowding in Europe by cutting pre-trial detentions and using alternative punishments for minor offenses. The move came after the European Court of Human Rights ordered Italy to address the problem [JURIST report] within a year. In August 2012 the Colombian Ministry of Justice announced a new initiative [JURIST report] to solve the problem of overcrowding in the nation’s prisons. In June 2012 UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights Kyung-wha Kang urged the government of Malawi [JURIST report] to address the problem of prison overcrowding and improve the human rights condition in the country. In April 2012 South Africa announced that it will issue pardons [JURIST report] to 35,000 offenders in order to ease prison overcrowding