Top European court finds out bad conditions of detention in Chisinau-based penitentiary

Chisinau, 9 November /MOLDPRES/ - The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has found out, in 15 files, bad conditions of detention in the penitentiary No 13 of Chisinau, the Legal Resources Centre of Moldova (CRJM) said today.

According to ECHR, the most serious problems would be: overcrowding, anti-sanitary living conditions (parasitic insects, presence of dirt, lack of blankets, rodents, of proper ventilation and of access to daylight) insufficiency and bad quality of the food provided.

At the same time, ECHR ascertained that the Moldovan legislation law did not give right to courts or any administrative body which consider a complaint to immediately improve the conditions of detention of a person – an improving depending on the earmarking of resources from the state budget.

On 21 November 2013, the Moldovan government unveiled an action plan on improving the legislation in the penitentiary system field and the conditions of detention, increase the system’s financing, revise the present way and practices in the process of enforcing measures of preventive arrest, in order to reduce the number of persons arrested, as well as to introduce an efficient way of appeal for bad conditions of detention.

“So far, only some of the measures have been enforced; yet, their impact was insignificant. On the contrary, unlike the 2013 year, the sum of allocations for the detainees’ nourishment has decreased, while the number of persons detained in penitentiaries has increased. Moreover, compared to 2013, the rate of admitting   petitions on applying preventive arrest has increased too,” reads a press release by CRJM.  

Over 1,000 persons are detained at the Chisinau-based penitentiary No 13.

(Reporter A. Plitoc, editor L. Alcaza)