MONITORING CONDITIONS AROUND THE WORLD

Shielded from public view, and populated largely by the poor, uneducated, and politically powerless, prisons tend to remain hidden sites of human rights abuse. By struggling against this

Interior panopticon cellhouse, Illinois State Penitentiary

natural tendency toward secrecy and silence, the efforts of numerous local human rights groups around the world -- who fight to obtain access to prisons, monitor prison conditions, and publicize the abuses they find -- are critical. In some countries, moreover, government human rights ombudspersons, parliamentary commissions, and other official monitors help call attention to abuses. In South Africa, notably, the national human rights commission has conducted numerous investigations into prison conditions, resulting in substantial public criticism of prison authorities.

At the regional level as well, prison monitoring mechanisms are active. The European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT), the most prominent of these bodies, inspected penal institutions in eleven countries in 1997, including those of Turkey, Spain, and Estonia. In December 1996, the CPT released a public statement on Turkey, declaring that "resort to torture and other forms of severe ill-treatment remains a common occurrence in police establishments in Turkey."

In Africa, the special rapporteur on prisons and conditions of detention, an adjunct to the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, began work in January 1997 and made an initial fact-finding mission to Zimbabwe in early March. Human rights organizations with observer status at the commission reported, however, that the special rapporteur's oral report on his mission presented an insufficiently detailed or critical view of the country's prison situation. In August 1997, the special rapporteur inspected prisons in Mali.

The following are among the many organizations around the world that monitor prison conditions and expose prison abuses.

Africa

• Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR), Johannesburg, South Africa
  
  
• South African Prisoners' Organisation For Human Rights (SAPOHR), Johannesburg, South Africa
  
  

Americas (Latin America and the Caribbean)

• Asociación Pro Derechos Humanos (APRODEH), Lima, Peru
  
  
• Comissão de Direitos Humanos da Assembléia Legislativa da Bahia, Salvador, Bahia, Brazil
  
  
• Comité de Familiares de las Víctimas de los Sucesos de febrero y marzo de 1989 (Cofavíc), Caracas, Venezuela
  
  
• Coodinadora Nacional de Derechos Humanos, Peru
  
  
• Instituto Defensa Legal, Lima, Peru

• Organização dos Advogados do Brasil, Brazil
  
  
• Programa Venezolano de Educación-Acción en Derechos Humanos (Provea), Caracas, Venezuela
  

Asia

• Center for Prisoners' Rights, Tokyo, Japan
  
  
• Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor
  
  
• Legal Aid of Cambodia (LAC), Phnom Penh, Cambodia
  
  

Europe and Central Asia

• Moscow Center for Prison Reform
  
  

Middle East

• Egyptian Organization for Human Rights (EOHR), Cairo, Egypt
  
  

United States

• ACLU National Prison Project, Washington, D.C.
  
  
• California Prison Focus, San Francisco, California
  
  
• Prison Law Office, San Quentin, California
  
  
• Southern Center for Human Rights, Atlanta, Georgia
  
  
• Stop Prisoner Rape (SPR), Los Angeles, California
  
  

International

• Amnesty International

• Centro por la Justicia y el Derecho Internacional (CEJIL)

• L'Observatoire international des prisons (OIP)

• Penal Reform International

• World Health Organization: Health in Prisons Project