“This tenth edition of the World Prison Population List gives details of the number of prisoners held in 222 independent countries and dependent territories. It shows the differences in the level of imprisonment across the world and makes possible an estimate of the world prison population total. The information is the latest available at the beginning of October 2013. The first five editions of the List were published by the Research and Statistics Directorate of the UK Home Office; this is the fifth to be published by the International Centre for Prison Studies and it complements the information which ICPS already publishes and updates monthly on the World Prison Brief section of its website www.prisonstudies.org. The World Prison Population List is compiled from a variety of sources. In almost all cases the original source is the national prison administration of the country concerned, or else the Ministry responsible for the prison administration. Most figures relate to dates between September 2011 and September 2013. Since prison population rates (per 100,000 of the national population) are based on estimates of the national population they should not be regarded as precise. In order to compare prison population rates in different regions of the world median rates have been used because they minimise the effect of countries with rates that are untypically high or low.”