BUDAPEST, Nov. 19 (Xinhua) -- Hungarian prisons are less crowded now than they were a few years ago, daily newspaper Magyar Idok (Hungarian Times) reported on Monday, citing colonel Mihaly Kovacs, director of Incarceration at the Hungarian Prison Service.

"Hungarian prisons are saturated and run at 123 percent capacity, but this number is significantly down from 143 percent in 2013," Kovacs told the newspaper.

"The decrease has been achieved by the creation of new cells for 1,600 inmates in older buildings, and the creation of a new prison in Kiskunhalas (Central Hungary), able to accommodate another 470 person," Kovacs added.

The Hungarian Prison Service is an armed law enforcement agency under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of the Interior.

The Hungarian Prison Service carries out measures and sentences of imprisonment and criminal procedure enforcement measures and also executes confinements for fine defaulters and deals with law enforcement custody.