NewsLatin AmericaOVP denounces that prisoners in Venezuela face "precarious" conditions of hygiene and food

OVP denounces that prisoners in Venezuela face “precarious” conditions of hygiene and food

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The NGO Venezuelan Prison Observatory (OVP) has denounced this Monday that the prisons of Venezuela are used as “depots for people”, and has pointed out the “precarious” hygiene conditions and the feeding problems suffered by the inmates in these centers.

This has been stated by the director of the OVP, Carolina Giron, who has maintained that the prison population does not receive the “rights” stipulated in the Mandela Rules, which stipulate a series of minimum conditions that prisoners must receive and that serve as the basis for prison policies of each country.

“Persons deprived of liberty are subjects of rights, by virtue of the fact that the only thing a person loses when they enter prison is freedom. When they are asked to comply with the minimum rights of food, health service, a decent space, they are rights, not privileges,” Giron said in a statement released by the organization.

The director of the OVP has made reference to the 122 norms established in the Minimum Rules of the United Nations for the Treatment of Prisoners, known as the Mandela Rules and that in Venezuela would not be fulfilled.

In addition, Giron has stressed that these regulations are for those prisoners who have a final sentence, although it does not apply to those who are in preventive detention. This would be a problem for the Latin American country, since the prisons of Venezuela “are full of prisoners who are currently in the process of being processed.”

The activist has also pointed out that “one of the main problems” is corruption related to the training received by personnel in the prison service, and has added that it is one of the fundamental pillars for the modernization of the prison service.

“They cannot be officials of those security forces because they are trained for repression, for citizen security. They are not trained to work with people deprived of liberty,” Giron said.

Likewise, the human rights defender has stressed that currently the prisoners “are being treated badly” and that with this “resentful and hateful people are being created”. “Not even South African prisoners are treated like in Venezuela, who do not have access to food, medical services, drinking water,” she has argued, adding that the problem is the responsibility of the State.

According to OVP data, from 1999 to 2021, 7,792 people have died in Venezuelan prisons, and from 2018 to 2021, the percentage of deaths from malnutrition and tuberculosis exceeded violent deaths.

“Nobody has to die in prison, because the prison is under the responsibility and custody of the State. It is something that cannot be allowed, we invite you to reflect on our prison system and review the Mandela Rules”, stressed the director of the NGO.

Source: Europa Press

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