Posts Tagged ‘Kyrgyzstan’
February 23rd, 2012
Access to the website of independent news agency Ferghana was
blocked this week by telecommunications company Kyrgyztelecom in response to a formal request from the Kyrgyz state communications agency. In a resolution made public on 16 June last year, the Kyrgyz parliament called for access to the site to be blocked on the grounds that its coverage of violence in southern Kyrgyzstan in June 2010 had been “subjective” and “provocative”.
December 2nd, 2011
One of the writers championed by Index on Censorship and English PEN to mark 50 years of the Writers in Prison Committee, Uzbek journalist Djamshid Karimov was released from a psychiatric hospital on 30 November.
Djamshid Karimov, nephew of Uzbek president Islam Karimov, is an outspoken critic of the government, known for reporting on socio-political issues. He worked as a freelance journalist for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, and contributed to independent newspapers and online publications under the pseudonym Andrei Nazarov. After reporting on the Andijan massacre in May 2005, during a period when his uncle systematically sought to silence all independent voices of protest, Karimov and his family were subjected to intense police surveillance.
In August 2006, after applying for an exit visa to attend a journalism seminar in Kyrgyzstan, Karimov’s passport was seized by the authorities. The head of the regional administration in Jizak visited the family home on 31 August, and offered Karimov positions at two state newspapers, apparently in a bid to entice him away from independent journalism. He refused and shortly afterwards, on 12 September, he disappeared. Two weeks later, Karimov’s friends discovered that he was being held against his will in a psychiatric hospital in Samarkand, initially under a six-month detention order. The authorities would not specify the reason for his detention, calling it a “private matter”. His fiancée was permitted to visit him and found him distressed by his detention; he had reportedly been forced to accept unnecessary treatment and anti-psychotic medication.
Karimov’s detention order was “reviewed” in March 2007 and extended for six months, but authorities disclosed no further details. Since then, as far as his family knows, the court has not officially passed a decision to further extend Karimov’s treatment. Nonetheless, despite regular promises that he would soon be discharged, he remains incarcerated. Karimov has now been undergoing forced treatment for more than four years.
Beyond Bars
This article originally appeared in Beyond Bars: 50 Years of the PEN Writers in Prison Committee. To subscribe to Index, click here.
September 13th, 2011
All charges against freelance journalist Elena Bondar in
Uzbekistan have been dropped. Bondar was
detained at Tashkent airport on 22 August returning from a journalism seminar in Kyrgyzstan, she was told she faced prosecution because she did not declare professional material that was seized from her.
August 23rd, 2011
Uzbek journalist Elena Bondar
was detained at the arrivals area of Tashkent airport after attending a course on modern journalism tools organised by OSCE and Deutsche Welle in Bishkek,
Kyrgyzstan. After a thorough examination of her documents and baggage, customs officials let the journalist go home, but confiscated CDs and USB flash drives with training materials.
August 16th, 2011
Shokhrukh Saipov, the Osh-based editor and publisher of news website Uz Press, was last week
attacked by unidentified individuals. Saipov had been attending a media seminar in Osh, and was found unconscious with his nose and several teeth broken on a street in the village of Aravan, 17 miles outside of the city. Family members have said Saipov was hospitalised overnight and diagnosed with a severe concussion and partial memory loss. The journalist is also the younger brother of
Alisher Saipov, the prominent reporter killed in southern
Kyrgyzstan in October 2007, and whose murder remains unsolved.
July 29th, 2011
Kyrgyzstan’s Central Elections Committee (CEC) has
decided to bar web-based news media from participating in the campaign ahead of the 30th October presidential election. Eleven news sites have been denied accreditation to inform voters on pre-election developments. While some NGOs have
claimed the move restricts citizens’ access to information, a CEC spokeswoman said, “the Kyrgyz law on mass media does not regard web-based news agencies as media outlets; that is why they cannot generate revenue from promotion of the candidates.”
The decision comes just weeks after Kyrgyzstan became the first country in former Soviet Central Asia to
decriminalise libel, a move hailed by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) as a boost for press freedom.
February 28th, 2011
Kyrgyz journalist Nazgul Kushnazarova was badly
beaten near her home on 22 February. None of her possessions were taken, which has given rise to speculation that it was motivated by her
professional activities. Kushnazarova is a journalist at the private radio station Almaz and anchor of a show called “Current Thoughts” about political, economic and social issues in Kyrgyzstan. She has been admitted to hospital with multiple injuries.
October 19th, 2010
Microsoft is
extending its program of giving free software licences to non-profit organisations. The initiative was first applied to Russia, after it was discovered that authorities were using software piracy inquiries as a method of suppressing independent media outlets and advocacy groups. The program will now include 500,000 NGOs in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, China, Malaysia, and Vietnam. Prior to the announcement NGOs could only obtain a free licence if they were aware of the program and followed the necessary procedure. According to
Microsoft’s official blog announcement, the unilateral licence will last until 2012.
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