There are 73 prisons in Kazakhstan, including 17 colony-settlements. Most of the places of detention are overcrowded. The total number of the convinced in the Republic of Kazakhstan exceeds 56.000. In 2007 only the number of sentenced increased for 4.300 (Regnum, March 19, 2008).

A judge Wednesday ordered Adelphia founder John Rigas and his son, Timothy Rigas, to report to prison on Aug. 13, nearly three years after they were convicted of one of the largest corporate frauds in U.S. history. Both men had been free on bail while they appealed, but U.S. District Judge Leonard Sand said the time had come for the two to start paying their debt to society, The Associated Press reported.

A report released Friday by the Council of Europe confirms that the CIA has used interrogation centers in Europe, including in Romania and Poland, to secretly hold and torture prisoners captured in Afghanistan, Iraq and other parts of the globe.