Belarus, Russia and Ukraine now have the highest prison population rates in Europe. The reason for these rises seems to be similar to the reason for the sharp upward trend throughout central and eastern Europe. The political and social changes which occurred in central Europe at the end of 1989 and which led to the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991 provoked increases in crime which, in the new climate of openness, were not hidden from the public. There was understandable anxiety which was not reduced by media coverage and this was reflected in increases in pre-trial detention and in the penalties imposed on convicted persons. The level of anxiety was made all the worse because the extra crime included several types that had not previously been encountered and for which no adequate legislation was in place.
Examples are economic crime, trans-national crime and in some countries even contract killings.
It is of interest to note that the rises in crime levels ended in most central European countries around 1992 and in countries of the former Soviet Union a little later, but this has usually not interrupted the upward movement of the prison population. The explanation for this is believed to be that the public and media are still anxious and the criminal justice officials continue to reflect this general attitude. Experts in that country advise that the level between 1991 and 1995 was kept artificially low by the inability of the criminal justice system to detect and convict those responsible for crime. In Hungary the prison population has not followed the pattern of other central European countries. Though rising between 1991 and 1993 in accordance with the rise in crime levels, it then fell back close to the 1991 level and at mid-1996 had remained stable for some 2 years.