Russian duma approves prison amnesty

The lower house of the Russian parliament, the Duma, has approved an amnesty for thirty-five thousand prisoners.

They are prisoners jailed for less than three years for minor offences, such as petty theft and will be released over the next six months.

The move is aimed at reducing overcrowding in Russian jails.

In November when he proposed the amnesty, President Yeltsin said the insanitary conditions in Russian jails failed to correspond to the Russian criminal code or to the obligations Russia assumed when it joined the Council of Europe.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service