1 percent of Turkish population incarcerated or on probation

About 1 percent of the Turkish population, or 984 per 100,000 people, was incarcerated or on probation as of Jan. 31, 2020, according to a report carried out for the Council of Europe.

Tuesday June 08 2021 10:58 pm

Duvar English

Approximately 1 percent of the Turkish population was incarcerated or on probation as of Jan. 31, 2020, according to the 2020 SPACE II annual survey, carried out for the Council of Europe by the University of Lausanne.

According to the report, there are 984 prisoners and probationers per 100,000 inhabitants in Turkey – a rate which is more than three times the European median.

As of Jan. 31, 2020, there were across Europe 265 prisoners and probationers per 100,000 inhabitants, the report found.

The highest probation population rates were found respectively in Poland (643 probationers per 100,000 inhabitants), Turkey (627), Lithuania (568) and Georgia (562), according to the report. The European median on the other hand was 149 probationers per 100,000 inhabitants.

Turkey marked an increase of 6.1 percent from 2019 to 2020 in terms of the number of probationers.

The report said that countries such as Turkey, Lithuania and Georgia are using community sanctions not as alternatives to imprisonment, but rather as supplementary sanctions.

“The reason is that their probation population rate is remarkably high, but their prison population rate remains above the European median value,” the report said.

The number of people on probation grew by 3 percent to 1.5 million in Europe from 2019 to 2020, the report said. This growth "continues a trend of expansion across Europe of community sanctions and measures such as electronic monitoring, community service, home arrest, treatments, semi-liberty and conditional release," the report said.