Prison laws need to be practical and applicable. The major problems of China's prison laws now include: First, the Prison Law itself is not perfect but with weak feasibility. For instance, Article 8 of the Prison stipulates that "The State shall ensure the expenditures of a prison for the reform of prisoners." But there is no responsibility investigation for not abiding by the stipulation. Of course, the prison system reform has greatly strengthened fund guarantee for prisons, but the funds are still not sufficient. Another example is Article 71 of the Prison Law: "With regard to the working hours of prisoners, a prison shall make reference to the State's relevant regulations on working hours; under special circumstances such as seasonal production, the working hours may be readjusted…" As there is no definition on "seasonal production', some prisons may possibly prolong the work time of prisoners. For instance, as the standard of "will no longer endanger the society after being released on parole" is vague, the decision-making organs may worry that they would be blamed if the criminals being released on parole committed crimes again. Thus, this approach is strictly used, forming many barriers for the prison law-enforcement work. This cannot help protect prisoners' rights, and may influence the dignity of the law. Second, the laws, regulations and department provisions are not well coordinated. There is no implementation regulation and detailed provision for the Prison Law. Third, the power layers in the construction of prison legal system in some regions are not clear, and there are many local policies and local regulations formulated without approval. Owing to the imperfect and incomplete prison law system, prison police may have no base in fulfilling their duties or fulfill their duties randomly. Thus, they cannot soundly act according to prison police's code of conduct and even infringe prisoners' rights sometimes.

Thus, we need to improve our prison legal system by clarifying the detailed duties of prison police. The improved prison legal system should consist of five layers in structure. The first is inheriting the parent law or source of law, namely the Constitution; the second is that the main parts of prison legal system, namely, the laws related to criminal punishment execution in Criminal Law, and the Criminal Procedure Law should match the Prison Law and the People's Police Law which are in parallel with the Criminal Law and the Criminal Procedure Law and other laws, regulations and decisions related to prison work issued by the National People's Congress and its standing committee. Currently, the issue of enriching and improving the Prison Law should be put on the agenda. The third is the provisions on prison work issued by the State Council, which mainly further detail or interpret the stipulations that are not covered, or not covered clearly, by the Prison Law. Presently, China should accelerate legislation construction in this layer so that the regulations and detailed provisions that match the Prison Law could be issued as soon as possible. The fourth is the judicial interpretations on criminal law execution issued by the Supreme People's Court and Supreme People's Procuratorate and the regulations and institutions on prison administration issued by the Ministry of Justice. Here, it is specially important to clarify, improve and perfect regulations and provisions issued by various ministries. The fifth is the regulations and provisions related to the prison work formulated by the local people congresses, governments and prison administration organs according to the basic state laws and regulations.

More importantly, while modifying and improving related laws, regulations and provisions, we should absorb the rules on prison or criminal correction in the international human rights conventions China has joined or will join. For instance, China has joined the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. Though China has clear stipulations in its law banning extorting confessions by torture, China should further detail the work from procedures to entity so as to coordinate it with the Convention. This is also an important precondition and basis for the prison police to fulfill their duties. In general, administering prison according to law is the basis and precondition for prison police to fulfill their duties better. All the prison works should be on the track of legalization and standardization. We should resolutely clear off all the regulations and provisions that violate the laws of upper levels (including the regulations and provisions that are not in line with the international human rights conventions China has joined) or cannot help improve the quality of prisoner education and reform.

Twenty years have passed after China issued the Prison Law. We hope that, based on the amendment of the Prison Law in 2012, China's legislation department will modify and improve the law again soon. On this occasion, the prisoners' human rights protection in China will further strengthened.

The author is Research Fellow and Director of Division of Human Rights in Justice of Institute for Crime Prevention of Ministry of Justice.

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