The World Bank’s 2023 list of fragile and conflict-affected situations (FCS) released annually lists 17 countries as conflict-affected, and 20 as those that are affected by high levels of institutional and social fragility. In such situations, people detained, whether under criminal justice systems or for conflict-related reasons (the latter falling outside of the scope of this report), face widespread ill-treatment and life-threatening conditions. There are approximately 602,705 people held in pre-trial detention awaiting trial or serving a sentence in the 37 countries classified as FCS by the World Bank. Of those countries, 14 have prison occupancy levels of at least 150%.
Prisons can be targets for external attacks and prison escapes, for instance it was reported that a rebel group operating in Ethiopia broke into a prison in Bule Hora, Southern Oromia, and freed 380 individuals in January 2023. In July 2022, an armed group attacked the Kuje medium security prison in Abuja, the Nigerian capital. In total, 879 people escaped during the attack, including 68 Boko Haram members, and while half of those were found, this attack was only one of many. Between 2020 and 2022, more than 5,000 people escaped from Nigerian prisons under similar incidents. In Syria, an ISIL attack on a prison in January 2022 resulted in a 10-day battle that drew in US and UK forces and, according to the UN, led to 500 fatalities and displacement of at least 45,000 residents. The fate of the detained, including 700 boys held among a population of around 3,000, including foreign nationals, remains unknown as officials only disclosed the death toll among the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), suspected members of the Islamic State and civilians. In April 2023, amidst the conflict that erupted in Sudan, people were released from the Kober prison in Khartoum after a wave of protests led by detainees due to the lack of gas and water shortages this was followed by an attack by the Rapid Support Forces on Al-Huda prison to release members of their group.
There have been widespread reports of people detained being forced to accept Russian citizenship or work forcibly for the Russian army.
In the war in Ukraine, Russia has used prison facilities as military bases to store ammunition and to accommodate soldiers at night. It is also reported that rocket launchers and missile systems have been set up adjacent to prisons in the occupied regions. There have been widespread reports of people detained being forced to accept Russian citizenship or work forcibly for the Russian army. After widespread reporting that prisons in Russia were used as recruitment grounds by the Wagner Group, a private military and security contractor, under a scheme in which people were detained an amnesty if they signed up to go to Ukraine, the head of the Wagner Group announced in February 2023 that they had halted the programme. Allegations have surfaced suggesting that those recruited were regularly threatened and ill-treated and that several recruits been executed or seriously injured for attempting to escape.
Prison systems in fragile and conflict-affected situations typically face high levels of overcrowding, poor detention conditions and widespread torture or ill-treatment. In Haiti’s prisons, with overcrowding levels at 401%, the Ombudsperson among others reported on torture, sexual violence and inhumane treatment. A study published in December 2022 found that men in the country’s prisons are consuming fewer than 500 calories a day and there have been reports that scores of people in prison have died of malnutrition.
In Venezuela, the Social Humanitarian Observatory reported that malnutrition and TB are the leading causes of death in the country’s prisons, where nearly 60% of the prison population show symptoms of severe malnutrition, suffer from deprivation of drinking water, and lack medical services.
In fragile and conflict-affected situations, prison reform efforts are often focused on transition of prison administration from military or police to civilian administration.
Transitions are typically lengthy, and, in many cases, reform efforts and international donor interest and financing have not borne fruit. In Niger, for example, the transition to civilian administration has been referenced in the national legal framework since 1991, and this agenda has recently resurfaced with the arrival of a Minister of Justice who has spent time in prison and was a civil society actor. Until the prison administration corps is fully trained and deployed, however, the Niger National Guard, a non-specialised corps with little human rights training, remains in charge of prison administration and surveillance.
Plans to transition prison administrations from military to civilian leadership have also been made in Honduras. In August 2022, the president ordered police to take over from the military, which had been in charge of prisons since 2019, as part of the transition.