Deadly Prison Fire in Indonesia

Overcrowding, mass escapes, protest riots, extremism, and corruption: Indonesia’s prisons have long been a hotbed of problems in Indonesian prisons.

A fire killed 41 inmates in an overcrowded prison block in Indonesia's Banten province on Wednesday. The fire, the country's most deadly since 47 perished in a firework factory disaster in 2017, broke out at 1.45 a.m. local time in a Tangerang Prison block, said Indonesian law and human rights minister Yasonna Laoly, after visiting the scene.

The preliminary investigation into the cause of the fire pointed to a short circuit in one of 19 cells in prison Block C2, Jakarta Police Chief Fadil Imran said. Block C2 was stuffed full of 122 convicts. Cells were locked at the time, a government minister said, but with the fire raging uncontrollably, "some rooms couldn't be opened."

Prisons in Indonesia are too overcrowded, with experts saying the phenomenon is partly due to the emphasis on incarceration rather than rehabilitation of those convicted of drug-related offenses under the country's strict narcotics laws.

On Wednesday morning local TV showed footage of flames engulfing the detention facility, and later, the building's charred remains as victims were pulled from the scene in orange body bags. Dr. Hilwani from Tangerang General Hospital told Reuters that some of the bodies had been so badly burning they were unidentifiable.

"We're working together with relevant authorities to look into the causes of the fire and of course formulating prevention strategies so that severe catastrophes like this won't happen again," the minister said in a statement. He expressed his deep condolences to the families of the victims and pledged to provide the best treatment for injured victims.

Jailbreaks and riots that lead to fire are common in Indonesia, where overcrowding has become a problem in prisons that are struggling with poor funding and large numbers of people arrested in a war on illegal drugs.

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