AMMAN, 25 December 2007 — Jordan’s National Center for Human Rights (NCHR) yesterday called on the government to take effective measures to improve conditions in the country’s prisons.
In its fifth report on the situation of human rights in the kingdom, the NCHR expressed dissatisfaction with the utter disregard for the center’s reports on correcting the prison system shown by government agencies.
The report said that all efforts aimed at reforming prisons would face setbacks unless they were coordinated under a national strategy that “takes into consideration” the legislative and social aspects of criminal justice in the kingdom and relevant international standards.”
The NCHR mentioned a number of shortcomings, including torture, lack of communication with the outside world, low-quality infrastructure, crowding, improper medical care, deteriorating educational programs and lack of social and psychiatric services.
It also criticized the arbitrary use of powers by governors to detain people.
The state-funded human rights watchdog reported the death of 21 inmates and the staging of 867 strikes inside prisons during 2007.
However, the report praised some steps taken by the General Intelligence Department, particularly allowing the International Committee of the Red Cross to carry out regular visits to detainees.
Jordan’s largest political party, the Islamic Action Front (IAF), meanwhile welcomed a report by New York-based Human Rights Watch that criticized Jordanian laws which it said were restrictive of freedoms.
“The party sanctions the HRW’s precise description of the appalling deterioration in the situation of human rights in Jordan as well as the report’s recommendations to the Jordanian government,” the party’s official spokesman, Rhayyel Gharaibeh, said in a statement.
In a report released last week, HRW criticized Jordanian restrictions on freedom of public assembly.
