Prison wardens report Cyprus to Council of Europe

Trade union Isotita has reported the Cypriot government to the Council of Europe over alleged mistreatment of prison wardens who are members and representatives of the union. According to news website Alpha, the case has been officially registered at the European committee of social rights, which is the Council of Europe’s monitoring body for the European social charter, the document which outlines economic and social rights for the citizens of the Council of Europe’s 46 member states. With the report having been filed, the Cypriot government now has until July 30 to submit its own observations regarding the case. The union’s complaint concerns alleged mistreatment of its prison wardens’ branch’s deputy leader Giorgos Maltezos, who it says highlighted in December last year issues of “overcrowding, uncontrolled drug trafficking, and chronic understaffing” at Cyprus’ central prison. Related Articles • Fitiris: ‘prison guards cannot take 200 days of sick leave and then protest’ • Prison wardens allege intimidation, harassment campaign It pointed out that the Council of Europe’s own committee for the prevention of torture had itself highlighted the same issues in a report it published last October. However, it said, after Maltezos had attempted to draw attention to these issues, “a series of adverse measures followed”, with those measures allegedly including “his sudden removal from the shift system where he had worked for a number of years”, and the assignment of duties under the direct supervision of an executive belonging to another union. It also alleged that time allotted to him for trade union duties was treated as a revocable concession rather than an acquired right, and that as such, he was written up as “unjustly absent” from his duties when he informed his superiors that he would be performing trade union duties, even when he informed his superiors well in advance. Additionally, the union said that its prison warden’s branch leader Constantinos Constantinou was “verbally assigned duties in confined spaces”, despite “binding” doctors’ notes excluding him from such duties. The assignment, it said, remains ongoing, despite the fact that the union has requested that he be assigned other duties. It argued that the incidents it brought to light are not isolated, but “manifestations of an orchestrated effort to silence” the union and its representatives, “and to weaken, and ultimately close down” the union. This, it said, is “an objective indication of the lack of neutrality on the part of the state”. On this front, it also said that the government has provided over €8.4 million in sponsorship to another trade union since 2017, while it has not allocated a single euro to Isotita. Maltezos’ assertion that the central prison is overcrowded was acknowledged by Justice Minister Costas Fitiris last month, when he declared that it and other holding facilities are “full”, and that the government is “trying to find solutions”. Among the solutions sought is the planned construction of a new prison near the Nicosia district village of Mathiatis, though Fitiris had said previously that this may take four or more years to build. However, the village’s mukhtar Theodoros Tsatsos said that he has not agreed to the plans, and that they can only go ahead with the village’s consent. He argued that there is no space left in the village, which already hosts two army camps, archaeological sites, churches, and farms.