Tanzanian police arrested after jail deaths

Six police officers have been arrested in Tanzania after 19 prisoners suffocated to death in an overcrowded cell in the south-west of the country.

Fifteen other inmates were taken to hospital, including two who are still in a critical condition.

Up to 130 inmates had been packed into a cell supposed to hold only 30 people at Mbarali police station in Mbeya region.

Internal Affairs Minister Mohammed Khatib has said overcrowding is a growing problem in Tanzanian prisons, where 42,000 people are currently incarcerated although the system can only accommodate 22,000.

Negligence?

The commanding officer of Mbarali district, Adam Semfukwe is among the officers who are being held for questioning by police.

The others are Laston Mwalugaja, the commander of Mbarali police station, and four other policemen.

If it is proved that they were negligent, legal action will be taken against them, the Tanzanian Guardian newspaper reports.

The human rights commission has sent an official to look into the deaths, and the interior minister, who was expected in Mbarali on Wednesday, has ordered an investigation.

The victims were among 85 suspects who had been moved from a remand jail to the police station so that they could attend a hearing at a nearby district court on Monday.

There are no prison facilities in Mbarali and the police custody there can accommodate only 30 people.

The Guardian reported that cries for help by the prisoners were ignored by the prison guards who thought it was a ploy to escape.

"A prison warden on guard did not do anything for fear that the remandees could have planned to escape," the paper said.

"The prisoners were reportedly shouting that they were running out of breath and that some of them were vomiting blood."

Various non-governmental organisations have called for an urgent reform of the country's prison system, according to Reuter news agency.