In the EU, 13 Member States reported prison overcrowding. Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic have the highest prison populations in the EU. According to the latest Eurostat figures, there were around 499,000 prisoners in the EU in 2023. This represents an increase of 3.2% compared to the previous year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Authorities predict that the number of prisoners could increase by up to 200% between 2023 and 2027 due to political changes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Between 1993 and 2023, the highest number of prisoners was recorded in 2012, with 553,000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One in five prisoners in the EU had a foreign nationality in the reference country in 2023. Compared to EU countries, the highest rates of prisoners per 100,000 people in 2023 were recorded in Poland with a rate of 203, followed by Hungary with 187 and the Czech Republic with 181.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In contrast, the lowest rates were recorded in Finland with 53 prisoners per 100,000 inhabitants, the Netherlands with 66 and Slovenia with 68.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Overcrowded cells raise safety concerns<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2023, 14 countries had some excess capacity, or \u201cempty cells,\u201d while 13 countries had overcrowded cells.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Overcrowding occurs when the number of prisoners exceeds the number of places a prison is designed to accommodate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The highest overcrowding was observed in Cyprus, with an occupancy rate of 226.2, France with 122.9, and Italy with 119.1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In contrast, the lowest prison occupancy rates were recorded in Estonia with an occupancy rate of 56.2, Luxembourg with 60.8, and Bulgaria with 67.7.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Overcrowding affects both those held in prisons and staff, resulting in increased violence, exhaustion, and reduced control within facilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For example, in Spain, overcrowding has reportedly allowed criminal gangs to operate more freely inside prisons, while in Slovenia, access to healthcare has been severely affected and the cancellation of 1,416 escorts has led to significant delays in court proceedings in 2023 due to pressure on resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Slovenian prisons have also seen an increase in conflicts between prisoners, with recorded incidents increasing from 207 in 2020 to 314 in 2023, according to Penal Reform International.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In the EU, 13 Member States reported prison overcrowding. Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic have the highest prison populations in the EU. According…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24293,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[818,390],"tags":[25,470,6946,6945],"class_list":["post-24292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe","category-politics","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-prison","tag-prisons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24292"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24292\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24294,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24292\/revisions\/24294"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/24293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}