At least 17 prisoners have died in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s main prison in the past week.
The Bill Clinton Foundation for Peace attributed the deaths to lack of food and medicine. Makala Prison in the capital, Kinshasa, which houses more than eight thousand inmates, has not received food supplies for the last two months.
Congolese officials say the inmates have to rely on their families for foods. The prison is severely overcrowded as it has five times the number of prisoners it was built for.
Conditions are so poor that non-governmental groups estimate at least 100 prisoners are gravely ill and close to death.
DR Congo’s Deputy Minister of Justice is reported as saying that Makala Prison had now received some funding to help improve conditions.
He promised more money would follow, but human rights organisations remain sceptical.
