CARACAS: Venezuela's prison population has swelled to its largest ever recorded of more than 44,500 inmates, according to Interior Minister Tareck El Aissami, as fears rose of gross overcrowding.In a report Tuesday to lawmakers in the national legislature, El Aissami said the number of inmates was 44,520 in 2010 and said the figure should spur a "greater commitment to transformation of the Venezuelan justice system."
The minister did not specify the official capacity of the country's prisons, but according to the non-governmental monitoring group Venezuelan Violence Observatory (OVP), the system was intended to house just 15,000 inmates.According to the OVP, massive overcrowding was the main reason behind violence in the prison system, with 366 killed in 2009, and 221 inmates killed in the first half of 2010.
Opposition lawmaker Alfredo Osorio reminded El Aissami pointedly that "over 90 percent of the people in prison are awaiting sentencing," and called for drastic reform to the system.Earlier Tuesday official data meanwhile showed Venezuela had the highest murder rate in Latin America last year, with 48 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants.El Aissami did not give the total number, but indicated that it amounted to around 14,000, although OVP, which follows crime trends in the country, puts the total at 17,600 homicides last year.The murder rate given by El Aissami surpassed those of neighboring Colombia, which was 32 per 100,000 inhabitants last year, and Mexico, which was 14 per 100,000 inhabitants.The world average is eight homicides per 100,000 people, according to official statistics.
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