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Eight out of 10 prisoners await trial

    ABIDJAN
    More than 80 percent of inmates await trial in squalid conditions in overcrowded prisons, according to a report on Monday on state-run Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) based on a visit to prisons in the southeast. According to the report, virtually all the prisons visited were old and overcrowded: one cell in Onitsha prison was the size of a classroom but held 60 to 80 inmates, all under the age of 16. The prisons have more than twice the number of inmates they were built for and over 80 percent of the detainees are awaiting trial, some for more than 10 years, NTA reported.

    This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions

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