- 85 The appalling conditions of detention at the Piraeus Transfer Centre should be highlighted; they could fairly be described as inhuman. The CPT has recommended that the Centre's detention facilities be extensively renovated without delay; if such a renovation were not to prove feasible, the existing premises should be taken out of service and the Transfer Centre located elsewhere, in a place capable of offering better detention facilities. 269. The problems highlighted above in the area of conditions of detention are no doubt, to a considerable extent, due to the massive inflow of aliens with which the Greek authorities are presently confronted. In this connection, the CPT welcomes the decision to set up an Aliens Holding Centre close to Athens Airport, which inter alia has relieved pressure on the detention facilities at Athens Police Headquarters; the opening of similar holding centres in other parts of the country might be advisable. Provided that a number of measures proposed by the CPT - concerning material conditions, activities and staff - are taken, the facility close to Athens Airport is capable of becoming a perfectly satisfactory holding centre. B. Prison establishments 270. The CPT's delegation found no evidence of torture in the prison establishments it visited and heard no allegations of such acts in other prisons in the country. Nor did the delegation hear any allegations of physical ill-treatment by prison staff in the different establishments visited, with the notable exception of Larissa Prison. 271. A considerable number of prisoners (both prisoners met at the Korydallos Prison Complex who previously had been held in Larissa Prison and prisoners met at Larissa) alleged that staff at Larissa Prison on occasion physically assaulted prisoners, in particular prisoners who displayed insubordination or insolence; such assaults were said to have occurred, in particular, in the establishment's segregation unit. More generally, the prison displayed a combination of factors which, in the delegation's view, meant that it had to be considered as a "high risk" establishment from the point of view of the possibility of ill-treatment occurring. Following a recommendation by the CPT's delegation, Larissa Prison was visited by the Ministry of Justice Prison Inspectorate. The inspection report provides a thorough analysis of the various problems facing the establishment and contains a coherent set of proposals to address them. As regards the specific question of the allegations of physical ill-treatment of prisoners by staff at Larissa Prison, it is evident from the Inspectors' report that the prison staff at Larissa has been made fully aware of the importance of stamping out any acts constituting an infringement of a prisoner's personal dignity. 272. The civil prison establishments visited by the CPT's delegation were grossly overcrowded and the Greek authorities made no secret of the fact that overcrowding was a nationwide problem. Whereas the official capacity of the prison system at the time of the delegation's visit stood at 3900, the number of prisoners actually held amounted to 6700. As a result, implementation of the modern and progressive "Code of basic rules for the treatment of prisoners" was being seriously undermined. To deal with this problem the Ministry of Justice had drawn up a major prison building/prison extension programme; at the same time, various legal measures had been adopted or were planned which should help to reduce the prison population.