Penal reforms under way says government

Penal reforms aimed to make the country's overcrowded penitentiary system more open and transparent are under way in Kyrgyzstan. "The conditions in the penitentiary institutions in Kyrgyzstan have notably improved over the past two years," Vladimir Nosov, the head of the Kyrgyz justice ministry's general directorate on corrections execution (GUIN), told IRIN in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek. The 2003 state budget had allocated some US $0.40 for the daily nutrition of each convict, double last year's rate, he said. Today, convicts in Kyrgyzstan were being provided with the main dietary components, Nosov noted, pointing out that compared to previous years the number of deaths of convicts in custody had dropped significantly. "This also shows the normalisation in the living conditions of the inmates," he observed. "Extensive activities on improving the conditions of convicts in the Kyrgyz penitentiary system, maintaining prisoners' rights, restoring order and discipline according to the international norms are under way," Ruslan Hakimov, a legal programmes coordinator for the Soros Fund in Kyrgyzstan, said. The main remaining challenge, however, was to decrease the prison population in the former Soviet republic. Currently, Soros Fund's experts on legal reforms are assessing the situation in Kyrgyz prisons under the Penal Reform International [PRI] project in Central Asia. PRI is an international NGO based in London which develops programmes on a regional basis to help both NGOs and individuals establish projects in their own countries. The Soros Fund, along with the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, is monitoring and arranging media coverage on the issue, with a view to drawing public attention to the penal reforms towards ameliorating conditions, as well as directing public opinion towards developing alternatives to imprisonment. Some notable achievements have been made in this context, one being that GUIN is no longer a closed and opaque institution. Another is that a centre providing convicts and their relatives with legal support has already been operating for two years now. Moreover, there are now initiatives to establish an Alcoholics Anonymous and centres to help drug addicts. According to some sources, drug addiction is widespread among convicts, many of whom are also HIV positive, having contracted the virus by way of injecting drugs. Some experts also stress the need for donor's assistance in funding reforms in the penal system as the government lacks the necessary resources to implement them.