COVID-19 spreads very fast in prison, warns rights organization

* Photo: Anadolu Agency (AA) - Archive

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Human Rights Association (İHD) Central Prisons Commission has issued its "Report on Rights Violations in Penal Institutions in Black Sea Region."

The report has been prepared based on the visits paid to the Rize/Kalkandere Type L Closed Penal Institution, Trabzon/Beşikdüzü Type T Closed Penal Institution, Giresun/Espiye Type L Closed Penal Institution, Ordu Type E Closed Penal Institution and Samsun/Bafra Closed Penal Institution between November 10 and 13, 2020.

The 23-page report of the association has shown that the prison conditions have got worse during the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

"Depriving prisoners of their right to meet their attorneys, friends and family, denying them their right to make a phone call, use the fax, send and receive letters, which is their way of communicating with the outside world, are practices that violate human dignity," the report has warned.

It has been further indicated that an effective administrative and judicial inspection is necessary for physical conditions and treatment of prisoners.

'Prisoners must be treated by specialist physicians'

Some details from the report are as follows:

"In prisons in the Black Sea region, people are not treated in line with human dignity; prisoners are subjected to violence, insult and ill-treatment and violations of rights; the treatment of ill prisoners is disrupted; they are prevented from using their right to communicate and obtain information.

"Having a sufficient healthy diet is a basic human right. Prisoners with health problems have the right to get the food prescribed by doctors. Ill arrestees or convicts must be provided with their diet by prison administrations.

"There needs an end to the practices of referring patients to hospitals in stuffy and cold shuttles in winter and hot ones in summer and keeping them waiting in the shuttles in front of hospitals for hours. It must be ensured that critically ill prisoners are referred to hospitals not in shuttles, but in ambulances. One-person shuttles must be abandoned altogether.

"The procedure of referring prisoners to infantries and hospitals must be accelerated. It needs to be ensured that they are diagnosed, treated and checked by specialist physicians.

"There needs an end to the practices of checking and treating prisoners in handcuffs. Several ill prisoners cannot be treated due to these practices.

"As required by medical ethics and just as every patient must be treated, every ill prisoner has the right to get healthcare services in an environment where their privacy and human dignity is respected.

'Prisoners must be transferred near their families'

"Independent medical institutions must be allowed to enter prisons and to conduct examinations. Necessary legal arrangements must be made to ensure that the relevant institutions, especially occupational institutions and human rights organizations, participate in the inspection of prisons.

"The obstacles standing in the way of buying newspapers against which there is no ban or confiscation order must be eliminated, these newspapers must be procured and given to prisoners.

"As for the prisoners distant from their families, their requests for a transfer to prisons near them due to economic conditions and illnesses must be accepted. However, as far as the İHD could detect, prisoners' applications for thid still remain inconclusive, their requests are being rejected.

"The recently increasing incidents of torture and battery in prisons must be ended, an investigation must be launched and penal sanctions must be imposed against the responsible persons.

'Prisoners must be provided with hygiene supplies'

"Considering that prisoners live together and in crowded wards, it is seen that COVID-19 outbreak spreads very fast in prison when the necessary measures are not taken.

"Prisoners must be given the necessary hygiene supplies and the optimum measures must be taken as to the contact of prisoners with the prison personnel, who are in contact with the outside world." (AS/SD)