Cyprus Mail 7 June 2024 - by Rebekah Gregoriades
Cyprus has topped the chart for prison overcrowding, with a staggering 166 inmates per 100 places.
The country’s prison records do not stop here, as it is also first for the percentage of female inmates, and in the top worst regarding the rate of foreign prisoners and the incarceration percentage.
“Prison overcrowding continues to be an acute and persistent problem in a significant number of European prison administrations,” the Council of Europe says in its annual penal statistics on prison populations (Space I) for 2023.
The report, published on Thursday, says in countries with over 500,000 inhabitants, 12 prison administrations reported having more inmates than places available in January 2023, one of which is Cyprus.
“Overall, in Europe, the number of prisoners per 100 places available grew by 2 per cent from 31 January 2022 to 31 January 2023,” it says, with Cyprus leading with 166 inmates per 100 places, followed by Romania with 120, France 119 and Belgium 115.
Finland, Denmark and England and Wales reported 97 prisoners per 100 places and Azerbaijan 96.
On 31 January 2023, there were 1,036,680 inmates detained in the 48 prison administrations of Council of Europe member states that provided this information out of 51.
Sixteen prison administrations experienced a significant increase in their prison population rates from January 2022 to January 2023.
Cyprus was third after the Republic of Moldova and North Macedonia, recording an increase of 25 per cent. Turkey was fourth with 15 percent, and Greece last with -5.2 per cent.
The countries with the highest incarceration rates were Turkey with 408 inmates per 100,000 inhabitants and the lowest North Macedonia with 142.
Prison administrations with the highest proportions of foreigners were Luxembourg with 78 per cent, Switzerland 71 per cent, Greece 57 per cent and Cyprus 55 per cent.
The lowest proportions were found in Romania, the Republic of Moldova and Azerbaijan with 1.1, 1.5 and 1.9 per cent respectively.
An overwhelming majority of the prison population were men, with women only accounting for 5 per cent of the prisoners. In Cyprus 9.2 percent were women, followed by Malta with 9.1 per cent, Czechia 8.5 percent and Finland and Latvia 7.7 percent.
Violent and drug-related offences represent more than half of the main crimes for which European prisoners are serving prison sentences. Drug offences are the most common offence with 19 per cent of the sentenced population, followed by homicide and attempted homicide 13 per cent, theft 12 per cent, sexual offences 8.9 per cent, robbery 7.7 per cent and assault and battery 6.7 per cent.
