The first prisoners from Sweden have arrived in Estonia
On August 18, the first flight carrying Swedish prisoners arrived in Estonia; under an agreement between the two countries, they will be housed at the Tartu prison.
According to ERR sources, the first plane carrying Swedish prisoners landed at the Ämari Air Base on Tuesday.
The prisoners are expected to be transported later today to the correctional facility in Tartu, which Estonia has leased for their accommodation.
Prison officials have not yet confirmed the prisoners’ arrival, noting that official information will be released later.
As a reminder, in June, the Estonian Parliament passed legislative amendments allowing foreign prisoners to be housed in Estonian prisons.
These amendments were necessary to implement an agreement between Estonia and Sweden.
Under the agreement, up to 400 cells at Tartu Prison can be used to house up to 600 Swedish prisoners.
Of these, 200 prisoners are expected to arrive in Estonia as early as this year.
Estonia will receive between 31 and 61 million euros per year for housing Swedish prisoners—depending on their actual number.
The agreement was signed for a term of five years, with the option to extend it for another three years.
Thus, Estonia will effectively use part of its prison system’s capacity to house prisoners from Sweden, receiving multi-million compensation in return.
This was reported by ERR.
Earlier, the Democratic Republic of the Congo released 15 prisoners and handed them over to the rebel Alliance of the Congo River/March 23 Movement (AFC/M23) in the eastern part of the country. The handover was announced by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which facilitated the operation. According to the organization, this is the first known handover of detainees between the DRC government and the AFC/M23 group under an agreement brokered by Qatar.
