Belgium’s prison crisis deepens as overcrowding hits 124% capacity
With 13,733 inmates held in facilities designed for 11,064, Belgium faces severe humanitarian and operational challenges, prompting criticism of government responses from experts and human rights advocates.
Prison overcrowding across Europe has intensified significantly since the pandemic, with Belgium emerging as a focal point of the crisis. As of mid-May 2026, the country’s 39 prisons held 13,733 inmates, far exceeding their designed capacity of 11,064. This surge places Belgium among the nations with the highest occupancy rates in Europe, alongside Cyprus, Slovenia, France, Croatia, Italy, Romania, and Austria. The situation has deteriorated to the point where 754 detainees were recorded sleeping on mattresses on the floor in mid-May, an increase from 672 in December 2025.
Conditions within the facilities have worsened markedly, with reports of spreading diseases including scabies, bed bugs, and monkeypox. Staff shortages have led to guard exhaustion and injuries, while critical incidents in prisons doubled within a single year. The crisis is exacerbated by a 2023 policy decision to enforce all sentences up to three years in prison, ending the previous practice of serving such terms via electronic monitoring. Consequently, the average detention period in Belgium has risen by 39.4 per cent over five years to 9.9 months, and the pretrial detention rate stands at 32 per cent, well above the European average of 24.7 per cent.
In response to the escalating emergency, the Belgian government passed a bill in July 2025, drafted by Justice Minister Annelies Verlinden. The legislation encourages alternative punishments for sentences under three years and allows for the early release of inmates serving terms of up to 10 years, up to six months before their scheduled release. The government is also exploring international solutions, including discussions with Estonia, Kosovo, and Albania regarding the rental of prison cells. Sweden and Denmark have pursued similar arrangements, with Estonia’s Ministry of Justice stating that transferred prisoners would remain protected under European human rights standards and could arrive by the end of summer 2026.
Critics, including criminologists and human rights advocates, have condemned these measures as ineffective and ethically questionable. An-Sofie Vanhouche, a professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, described the international cell rentals as populist and symbolic, arguing they fail to address the root causes of recidivism. Pieter Houbey, vice-chairman of the Central Prison Monitoring Council, warned that the combination of overcrowding and staff shortages makes it nearly impossible to maintain a detention system aimed at reintegration. With a reoffending rate of 60 to 70 per cent, experts argue that the current focus on security over societal reintegration perpetuates a cycle of crime and despair.
The human cost of the crisis is evident in the experiences of detainees. Inmates report spending 22 to 23 hours a day in cells with limited access to activities or medical support. Bilal, a 34-year-old inmate who has served time in five Belgian prisons, described conditions as degrading and reported experiencing suicidal ideation. Loic, a 23-year-old serving a sentence at Saint-Gilles Prison, which is scheduled to shut down by 2028, highlighted the difficulty of reintegrating into the workforce without residency permits or vocational training. Despite requests, the Belgian Ministry of Justice, along with its Swedish and Danish counterparts, did not provide comment on the ongoing developments.
