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Prison and Penal Reform Newsletter

In 2022, UNODC provided technical assistance on prison and penal reform to 43 Member States. This newsletter offers an overview of our work last year, plans for 2023, and detailed updates on eight of these countries.

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Introduction from the Team

Across the world, there are around 12 million people behind bars – a high and concerning number that continues to grow. The main purposes of imprisonment are to protect society from crime and to prevent reoffending by preparing prisoners for their social reintegration upon release. Yet prison systems around the globe face fundamental challenges that undermine their ability to fulfil those purposes: overincarceraton and prison overcrowding, poor prison conditions, systemic neglect and limited resources or staff capacities, a lack of political will to invest in evidence-based offender management, and barriers to enhancing knowledge and promising practices.

Effective and humane prison management provides the foundation for all other interventions. While the UNODC Prison and Penal Reform Team undertakes some programmes that focus on special categories of prisoners, such as violent extremist prisoners or returning foreign terrorist fighters, all of our work encompasses broader prison reform efforts. A key focus is the promotion of the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (known as the Nelson Mandela Rules), for which UNODC acts as custodian.

“It is said that no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones.” These words from Nelson Mandela remind us that the decisions taken on prisons affect each and every one of us.

What does the Prison and Penal Reform Team do?

The UNODC Prison and Penal Reform Team works with Member States to:

  • Reduce the scope of imprisonment
  • Strengthen prison management and improve prison conditions
  • Foster the social reintegration prospects of offenders.

In addition to providing technical assistance, UNODC currently supports Member States in the development of a new international standard in the form of model strategies on reducing reoffending.

Find out more

Ten highlights of 2022

1.     Promoting non-custodial measures: UNODC strengthened the capacities of 300 criminal justice professionals from 12 countries to use non-custodial measures in line with the Tokyo Rules and the Bangkok Rules.

2.     Ensuring safe and humane custody: UNODC strengthened the capacities of more than 30 national prison and corrections services to ensure safe, secure, and humane custody.

3.     Building knowledge: UNODC supported the establishment or reinforcement of research and training centers on different aspects of prison management in eight countries.

4.     Improving legislation: UNODC legislative support resulted in the enactment of new or amended prison laws in Indonesia and Somalia as well as on-going reviews of penal legislation in Ethiopia, Ghana, Kazakhstan, Viet Nam and Uzbekistan.

5.     Promoting gender responsive prisons: UNODC enhanced gender-responsive prison management in six countries including Ghana, Kenya and South Africa. We increased women prisoners’ access to vocational training in prisons in Mexico and Somalia and provided supplies for pregnant women and mothers with accompanying babies in prison in Lebanon.

6.     Strengthening infrastructure: With UNODC support, prison infrastructure was strengthened, and prison conditions improved in 16 member states. Support ranged from construction and refurbishment, including of facilities designated for rehabilitation programming, to the procurement of IT equipment to ensure sound file management as well as enhanced prison staff training.

7.     Promoting rehabilitation: UNODC invested in a more rehabilitative approach to prison and community-based offender management in 20 countries, including respective training for prison officers and the launch of diverse vocational training programmes for prisoners.

8.     Responding to challenges: UNODC responded to the impact of emerging challenges, including unequal COVID-19 recovery and disruptions caused by climate change and current armed conflict, the latter including a respective scoping mission to Ukraine.

9.     Promoting the Nelson Mandela Rules: UNODC launched a dedicated toolkit on the Nelson Mandela Rules during a special event on the occasion of Nelson Mandela International Day 2022. This was part of a UNODC-led global awareness-raising campaign on prison and penal reform reform, entitled #DignityUnlocked, which reached 3.5 million users on social media.

10.  Building partnerships: We strengthened our partnerships with relevant international organisations, including the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the International Penal and Penitentiary Foundation (IPPF), the International Corrections and Prisons Association (ICPA) and the European Confederation of European Probation (CEP); developed new partnerships; and continued to work closely with other agencies of the United Nations System.

Find out more
Managing violent extremism in prisons: final report
 
From 2018 to 2022, the European Union and United Nations system joined forces to deliver a global initiative working with Kazakhstan, Tunisia and Uganda to manage violent extremist prisoners and to prevent radicalization to violence in prisons.
 
Read the report

Country updates

Next to UNODC’s programmes directly implemented by our Field Offices, eight countries participated in UNODC’s Global Programme: Iraq, Ghana, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria, Tajikistan, Tunisia and Uganda. Read a brief summary of their activities in 2022, or click below for more detail plus upcoming plans for 2023.
 
Read country updates in full
Review of the current training curriculum of prison officers, Ghana

Ghana

Over the course of 2022, UNODC visited more than half of all prison facilities in Ghana to better understand the current state of prison management and to evaluate the Ghana Prisons Service’s compliance with international standards and norms, in particular the Nelson Mandela Rules. Based on the findings of the assessment, we have developed a tailored action plan for our three-year project in the country.
Find out more
Training session on dynamic training in Erbil, Iraq

Iraq

The Returning Foreign Terrorist Fighters Detention programme in Iraq has enhanced the capacity of national counterparts to effectively manage and mitigate threats posed by foreign terrorist fighters in custody and violent extremist prisoners by delivering training, bringing together key stakeholders including NGOs, and by improving prison facilities.
Find out more
Media training in reporting on violent extremism, Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan

In 2022, Kazakhstan joined the Group of Friends of the Nelson Mandela Rules – a Vienna-based group of over 30 Member States working to create awareness and promote the practical application of the United Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (the Nelson Mandela Rules). In addition, the EU / UN joint global initiative on preventing violent extremism in prisons came to a close, with delegations from Tunisia and Uganda coming together in Astana, Kazakhstan, for a final conference and study visit. Focused work took place with journalists to sensitize the media when reporting on violent extremism.
Find out more
Somebody has to do it, why not me?” The story of a female prison officer from Kazakhstan
 
Bibigul Munaitpasova, Head of the Department for Educational and Socio-Psychological Work, Prison Committee of Kazakhstan, has come a long way in her career. "At the beginning my relatives were scared to let me go to work in prison system, but I said: 'Somebody has to do it, why not me?' Now they understand and respect my choice. There haven't been many female predecessors in our system, and every day you feel almost like a pioneer."
 
Read Bibigul's story
Handover ceremony of security items to the prison service (16 December 2022)

Kyrgyzstan


Much of our work in in Kyrgyzstan has focused on the development of the probation system, which is still in its early days, recently reaching its third anniversary. Significant progress has been made this year, including: assessment missions of UNODC international rule-of-law and probation experts leading to two white papers on probation and information management; evidence collection from other countries; and training for probation staff.
Find out more
Training on the Nelson Mandela Rules e-learning course

Nigeria

In Nigeria, overcrowding remains a serious concern, largely due to the overuse and duration of pre-trial detention. As a result, the Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS) is confronted with severe challenges, including poor sanitary conditions facilitating the spread of infectious diseases, a lack of adequate vocational and recreational facilities as well as security threats, such as those posed by violent extremism. UNODC has partnered with NCoS on promoting the practical application of the Nelson Mandela Rules and strengthening the capacity of the NCoS to ensure the safe, secure and humane custody of prisoners in their custody.
Find out more
Download our free resources
 
The Prison and Penal Reform Team offers free resources in multiple languages to support good prison management, including handbooks on:
  • Prison leadership
  • Dynamic security and prison intelligence
  • Prisoner classification
  • The treatment of special categories of prisoners
Visit our resources page
Training in Dushanbe; training subjects in 2022 included the Nelson Mandela Rules, risks and needs assessment, and dynamic security and prison intelligence

Tajikistan

This year UNODC began the implementation of the Returning Foreign Terrorist Fighters (RFTFs) Detention Project in Tajikistan, which aims to build the capacity of the Tajikistan Prison Service to effectively manage RFTFs in detention, facilitating their rehabilitation and reintegration and preventing radicalization to violence in prisons. Working closely with the prison service, we have reviewed the training curriculum for prison staff who work directly with violent extremist prisoners and RFTFs; conducted security audits in prisons to assess the safety and security of the prisons and their compliance with human rights; and analyzed the existing legal framework governing the prison system with respect to international standards.
Find out more
"Prisons are meant to be places of justice and rehabilitation. Inhumane and dysfunctional prisons do not leave our societies any safer from violence and crime. In contrast, rehabilitative prison environments help social cohesion and reduce reoffending.”
 
Ms Ghada Waly,
Executive Director, United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime
National retreat for civil society organisations, Tunisia

Tunisia

This year UNODC partnered with the Ministry of Justice and the General Committee on Prisons and Rehabilitation (CGPR) to support the founding of CRIMINO-TN – the first-ever Center for Research on Violent Extremism and Rehabilitation in Tunisia, which opened on 22 March 2022. The center will allow the development of evidenced-based policies relevant to the Tunisian context.
 
In addition, the team offered training and provided equipment to support rehabilitation programmes directly to prisons. These activities took place as part of the EU / UN global initiative on preventing violent extremism in prisons, and the national project Tawassol.
Find out more
Visit to vocational training workshop in a prison, Uganda

Uganda

This year saw UNODC work closely with the Uganda Prisons Service and the Uganda Law Society on an innovative intervention focussed on decongesting the national prison system. We also concluded the five-year EU / UN global initiative on preventing violent extremism in prisons. Other achievements of 2022 include a review of the policy framework on prison intelligence; piloting a new Prisoner Classification Framework; and training the Rehabilitation and Reintegration Technical Working Group on rehabilitation and reintegration interventions, with a special focus on developing an integrated approach for violent extremist prisoners.
Find out more
Decongesting Uganda’s prisons
 
This year UNODC partnered with the Uganda Law Society (ULS) to jointly implement the ‘Prisons Decongestion and Access to Justice Project’. The project enabled over 5,000 prisoners to access justice via pro bono legal support. Many cases concluded with access to bail or alternatives to imprisonment, such as community service. This was part of ongoing efforts to reduce congestion in Uganda’s prisons. Inhumane prison conditions, harsh treatment of prisoners and overcrowding contravene international minimum prison standards and are key factors that lead individuals to join violent extremist or terrorist groups.
Sharing our expertise in Germany

UNODC was invited by the Director of the Federal Police Germany (BKA) to present our current work on prison and penal reform at the 67th BKA Autumn Conference. The conference brought together 650 participants from law enforcement, academia and civil society to explore crime trends and strategies on how to fight crime. We discussed our experience in managing high-risk prisoners, including violent extremist prisoners and returning foreign terrorist fighters.

UNODC is grateful for the generous support of Member States to continue our work to assist countries in building and reforming their prison systems, and in implementing non-custodial sanctions and measures.
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