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RT
reports Norway’s prison system plans to rent Dutch prison cells amid a shortage
of available space as the Norwegian government said.
Norway,
with a reputation for providing its prison population with humane treatment,
now has a waiting list of 1,300 people waiting to enter its facilities. Not
necessarily because they are anxious to serve their sentences, but because
Norway is experiencing a shortage of cells amid renovation work.
The
Nordic country, with an incarceration rate of about 72 prisoners per 100,000
people, is attempting to maintain its high standards of prison life while at
the same renovating its aging facilities – at a cost of up to 4.4 billion
crowns (US$700 million).
Oslo
authorities are blaming the situation on the previous government.
"We inherited a challenging situation from
the [previous] government," Norway's Minister of Justice and
Public Security Anders Anundsen said, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
"To achieve a much-needed
expansion of prison capacity in the short term, we've started talks with Dutch
authorities on renting prison capacity in the Netherlands."
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The
move is not without precedent between countries. Beginning in 2009, over 500
Belgian inmates were housed in the Netherlands’ Tilburg Penitentiary.
"At the moment, the queue is at 1,300
custodial sentences, and there is a great demand for detention space,"
the Justice Ministry said in a statement. "The Netherlands has already leased prison capacity to Belgium
for several years."
Dutch
authorities say they have concluded a preliminary deal with Norway regarding
the renting of detention facilities, adding that a Norwegian prison warden
would supervise the inmates according to Norwegian law.
Norway’s re-offending rate
of around 20 percent is among the lowest in the world.
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