| Experts gathering Thursday on the heels of three
major international summits said the West's Liberal politicians
and human rights activists urged for the
passage of a bill that would
allow independent inspections of prisons and visits to inmates
Wednesday, saying
such visits would help root out prison abuses.
The bill, drafted by the State Duma committee on public
organizations, has been in
limbo for months after the Interior and Justice ministries
complained that it gave too
many rights to the visitors, representatives from civic
organizations.
The Cabinet rejected the bill last June but promised to
consider it again after the
Kremlin-sponsored Civic Forum in November.
"We have already narrowed our demands in this bill, and
for
many it may seem useless
and senseless now," Viktor Zorkaltsev, head of the Duma
committee on public
organizations, said at a round table Wednesday.
"We just hope to change the public's attitude toward prisons,"
he said, referring to the
widespread opinion that torture and undernourishment are a
normal part of prison life.
"The lawmakers who come after us will make even bigger changes
to expand the
public's influence on the prison system."
The Cabinet has not set a date to consider the bill. Deputy
Justice Minister Yury
Kalinin said his ministry had no plans to sign off on it in
time for it to go for a first
hearing in the Duma in September, as supporters want.
"We will give the bill our approval when we get a normal
draft," Kalinin told the round
table.
The bill allows the formation of an inspection commission in
each region of the
country. The commissions would be filled with representatives
from civic organizations
whose candidacies would be approved by the chief Russian
ombudsman.
The commissions would be able to visit detention centers and
prisons and talk with the
inmates. They could also collect complaints and defend
inmates' rights to
investigators, prosecutors and prison wardens.
The Interior Ministry is protesting the visits, saying a
prisoner whose case is under
investigation may pass on information to the commission that
would impede the probe.
The ministry also wants commission inspectors to have to get
permission from the
police before carrying out various activities.
The Justice Ministry says prison wardens should not have to
answer to inspectors
and has expressed concern about the technicalities of the
appointment and dismissal
of inspectors.
Yabloko party leader Grigory Yavlinsky said Wednesday that one
reason the bill has
gotten bound up in red tape is because of the peculiarities of
existing legislation, an
eclectic mix of Soviet-era laws that put the state's interests
over those of individuals
and newer laws that try to respect human rights.
"This is why [the government] says the bill contradicts
so
many laws," Yavlinsky said.
"This bill, together with the bill on alternative military
service and attempts to
implement a ban on the death penalty, demonstrates that our
legislation is developing
in between these [Soviet and post-Soviet] principles."
Zorkaltsev said prison monitors could go a long way in doing
some good in the
overpopulated and underfunded prison system. He said 5 million
people pass through
the system a year, and there are about 1 million people behind
bars at any given
moment. They are all exposed to disease, undernourishment and
torture at the hands of
other inmates and prison officials.
There is one example of independent prison inspections. Human
rights activists are
allowed to visit prisons and talk to inmates and collect their
complaints at any time in
the Saratov region.
"Prison officials treat us well because they see in us
an
additional way to fight the
scum in their system that they can't eliminate by themselves,"
said Saratov's
ombudsman Alexander Lando.
He conceded that the activists only won the right to visit
prisons due to his good
personal relationship with Saratov Governor Dmitry Ayatskov.
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