Posts Tagged ‘Uzbekistan’
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 31st, 2011
Elena Bondar, an Uzbekistani freelance journalist who was
briefly detained at Tashkent airport last week, has been notified that
she is to be prosecuted for not declaring the professional material that was seized from her at the time, and that it will be examined by a censorship committee. When interrogated again for three hours on 27 August, Bondar was told that she is to be prosecuted under articles of the customs law and the civil code for failing to declare the four USB flash drives, three CDs and two video cassettes that were taken from her when she landed in the Uzbek capital on 22 August. She is facing a possible fine on these charges.
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
A rights activist in central
Uzbekistan says she was detained on 15 August for an article in which she criticised the government requirement that citizens use state-issued bank cards for cash withdrawals or purchases. Saida Kurbanova told
RFE/RL she was summoned to the Pakhtakor district police station in Jizzakh Province where she was “dragged up the stairs” by officers. She was released after several hours. Kurbanova added that police told her she is being sued for libel over the article she wrote and posted online in March about the difficulties faced by people using the state-issued cards.
July 15th, 2011
Saodat Omonova, one of two women journalists protesting media censorship in
Uzbekistan, has ended her hunger strike after being
hospitalised earlier this week. It had been 16 days since Omonova and colleague, Malohat Eshonqulova, had begun their hunger strike after they were
arrested and fined for protesting outside the presidential palace. The pair were
were fired from state television channel Yoshlar last December, three days after they staged protests against media censorship. They are still fighting a court battle to appeal their initial dismissal.
June 28th, 2011
Uzbek journalists, Malohat Eshonqulova and Saodat Omonova, have been detained and fined 2.94 million soms (around £1000) for holding an unauthorized protest
on Monday morning.
The two women, who have now begun a hunger strike, held up placards in front of the presidential palace in Tashkent which read “Dear Islam Karimov, please grant us an audience”.
The pair were arrested after around four hours of protesting on 27 June, a day officially marked by Uzbekistan as the “
Day of Media Workers“. Eshonqulova and Omonova
were fired from state television channel Yoshlar last December, three days after they staged protests against media censorship and are still fighting a court battle to appeal their dismissal.
June 13th, 2011
Recent developments in a libel trial involving
Uzebkistan’s first family have raised concerns about the EU’s involvement with the Karimov family. The claim was
brought by President Karimov’s daughter, Lola, against French website
Rue89 after one reporter branded her father a “dictator”. Documents produced in court last week, which were originally intended to establish the credibility of the family, have raised questions about why the EU was communicating with Lola Karimov-Tillyaeva about the allocation of $3.7m worth of charitable funding.
