The Federal Penitentiary Service reported a decrease in the number of prisoners in Russia to 282 thousand.

The number of persons held in pre-trial detention facilities and places of deprivation of liberty has decreased to 282 thousand people. This was announced on May 14 by Arkady Gostev, Director of the Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN).

"If there were 465,000 at the end of 2021. [prisoners], now there are 282 thousand, of which 85 thousand are in pre—trial detention centers and facilities operating in a pre—trial detention facility," TASS quoted him as saying.

According to Gostev, the main factors of this dynamic were the humanization of criminal penalties, the expansion of the practice of assigning work and non-custodial measures. Among them, he named forced and suspended sentences, as well as restriction of freedom. In addition, the head of the service noted the impact of the work on the selection of contract soldiers in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, which has been carried out recently.

The director of the Federal Penitentiary Service also said that a significant part of the products manufactured in the colonies are intended for the needs of a special military operation. About 16 thousand convicts are additionally involved in this activity. During the year, the agency produced goods for its own production in the amount of about 5.5 billion rubles. In total, the volume of production in institutions of the penal system in 2025 reached 47 billion rubles.

The news is being updated