Foreign Affairs
I was terribly naive: I didn't understand why those Russian prisoners were looking at me so intently
Columnist Sylvia Witteman recalls a 1993 visit to a Russian prison where she realized inmates stared because they had not seen women in years. She contrasts the harsh conditions, including shared sleeping quarters and the presence of cats for comfort, with the privacy offered in Dutch prisons. The prison director criticized solitary confinement as inhumane, arguing that no amount of luxury could replace human connection.
Ozetta summarises; the reporting is the newsroom's