Sri Lanka’s government is drafting laws to allow courts to place suspects under house arrest instead of remanding them to ease severe prison overcrowding, according to a senior official.

According to justice minister Harshana Nanayakkara, Sri Lanka’s prisons, built to hold about 10,500 inmates, are currently housing nearly 39,000.

He said remand prisoners account for the main problem, noting that about 28,000 inmates are held in remand custody, including around 20,000 detained on drug-related offences.

The minister said the proposed law would allow courts to impose home detention in suitable cases instead of sending suspects to prison, reducing congestion in the prison system.

Mr Nanayakkara also said Sri Lanka has no structured mechanism to review or reduce sentences for prisoners serving life terms or facing the death penalty.

He said the government had appointed a committee to study the possibility of introducing a sentence-reduction framework for long-term inmates.

(Xinhua/NAN)