The Ecuadorian government will pardon 2,000 people and deport foreign prisoners to reduce overcrowding in local prisons. This decision was made after the riots that took place in the penitentiary center of Guayaquil in the west of the country.
According to the director of the penitentiary service Bolivar Garson, the elderly, women and terminally ill citizens will be amnestied, RIA Novosti writes. Also, 82 cases of foreign prisoners are under consideration, but the total number of those who will be deported is not specified.
According to experts, the prisons of Ecuador are designed for 29.6 thousand people, while now they contain about 40 thousand prisoners. So, in the prison of Guayaquil there are currently about 8.2 thousand prisoners with an estimated capacity of 5 thousand people. The country’s Ministry of Finance has allocated resources to build a new prison infrastructure in Ecuador.
We will remind, on Tuesday in the prison of Guayaquil during the riots, 118 prisoners were killed and 79 were injured. The incident was caused by a conflict between representatives of criminal gangs. Later, the state of emergency was introduced in all prisons in the country in order to prevent new incidents and normalize the situation.
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