Profile of a provincial jail

The voices of people yelling "Food food, food, we want our rights," mixed with the din of empty plates and dishes being knocked together rang out from the tiny dark windows of the Pol-e Khomri provincial jail in the northeastern Baghlan Province. When IRIN visited it, the inmates were on hunger strike in protest against insufficient food and poor living conditions in the antiquated and overcrowded facility. "We are sleeping on water in the tiny collapsed cells with inadequate food and no medicine. Every month, one room collapses and more prisoners are added to the number in the other rooms. This is like the harshest torture," Nur Mohammad, 25, a prisoner in the jail, told IRIN. Mohammad said there were 13 people in his poorly ventilated, dark cell. Almost all of the cells were like Mohammad's. The stench of human misery, the muddy floors and sickly-looking prisoners shivering in their thin blankets complete the picture. "We have had ministers and human rights people visiting here, but there is no change," said Mohammad. Prison officials conceded that things were reaching crisis proportions. "Every inmate is allocated 20 afghanis [40 US cents] for three meals, which is of course not enough even for simple bread and tea," Mohammad Yusuf, the governor of the prison, told IRIN. "A small- scale earthquake or a heavy rain will bring a human tragedy if we continue to stay here," he said. Women prisoners told IRIN food, medicine and child care were their most pressing needs. "There is no extra food for my children, although jail warders send their share, but it is not regular," Amir Begum, 45, convicted of murdering her husband, told IRIN. The mother of three said she had no relatives to feed her and her children in the prison. A wardress, who declined to be named, told IRIN it disgusted her to have to conduct visitors round the prison, as she had not seen a single development in the last two years. "Our main complaint is about the UN: it always asks questions and monitors, but takes no action. The prisoners and guards are waiting to see when these cells collapse and end this tragedy for good," she said, maintaining that there was only one habitable cell in the women's section of the jail, "If it collapses, then they will have to camp in the yard." The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, which is the lead agency in implementing reform within the justice and penal systems, told IRIN that conditions in Pol-e Khomri prison were similar to prisons in other parts of Afghanistan. It said it had already started justice and prison reform in the capital, Kabul, with an intention to start operating outside the city soon. Meanwhile, officials in Kabul told IRIN that lack of sufficient funds for prisoners' food and logistics constituted the major problem for all the approximately 3,000 convicts in the 32 government-run prisons across the country. "Yes, according to the current law, the food allocation of a prisoner is equal to that of a soldier, which is 40 afghanis per prisoner per day, but the ministry of finance has only allocated us 20 afghanis per prisoner," Abdul Salam Bakhshi, the director-general of prisons at the justice ministry, told IRIN. Bakhshi admitted that Pol-e Khomri jail was in a very bad condition. "I will go there in the next few days and will look for another facility in which to house the prisoners there," he said.