LEGAL REGULATION OF PUBLIC CONTROL OVER ENSURING THE RIGHTS OF CONVICTS: THE EXPERIENCE OF RUSSIA AND BELARUS
The penitentiary service is a part of the state law enforcement system and its activities are related to the interests of society. In this case, the process of execution of criminal penalties may be accompanied with harm to law enforcement interests of persons detained in prisons. The practice of penitentiary services around the world shows that there are still cases of violations of the rights and freedoms of convicts. That is why special attention has been paid to the involvement of various social groups for monitoring the rights of convicts. In each individual state, the system of control over the activities of the penitentiary service varies depending on the social and state system, the type of legal system, and the level of development of democracy. At the same time, regardless of these factors, the control over the penitentiary service is expressed in the collection of information about the activities of penitentiary institutions, the detection of violations in their work, and at the final stage in the notification of the competent authorities about the violations, monitoring the elimination of violations and shortcomings, informing the public of the results of their work. Exercising control, most democratic states draw attention to the fact that prisons, as an important part of public life, must be information-based, open and democratic. The main task of monitoring should be to ensure compliance with generally accepted ethical standards in the execution of penalties related to isolation from society. So, according to the professor of the International center for prison studies at the University of London Vivien Stern: «The international community has said, and international law has also noted, that the whole process of depriving a human being of liberty from the moment of arrest to the moment of release from a correctional institution must be humane. Humane means ethical. Throughout this process, we must remember that a prisoner is a human being like us and has the right to have his or her human nature respected». The presented work is devoted to the description and analysis of legal regulation of public control over ensuring the rights of convicts in Russia and Belarus. The review reveals the actual problems of normative regulation activities of public control subjects, as well as provides a comparative legal analysis of the regulatory framework of Russia and Belarus in this area.