Posts Tagged ‘Uzbekistan’
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.
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.
No Comments
Tags: Tags: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, censorship, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Malaysia, Microsoft, ngo, Russia, software, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Vietnam,
October 14th, 2010
The editor of the vesti.uz website, Russian
Vladimir Berezovskiy, has been found guilty of slander and insult and pardoned without sentencing by Tashkent’s Yakkasaray district court.
Berezovskiy believes the case against him was cooked up and the trial has been accompanied by
numerous violations. For example, Justice Nodyr Akrabov barred Danis Bashirov, an official from the Russian embassy in Uzbekistan, from the hearing, saying the diplomat needed permission from the Supreme Court.
During the hearing Berezovskiy’s lawyer Sergei Mayorov had to challenge the court as it had rejected several important motions from the defence.
No Comments
Tags: Tags: convicted, Danis Bashirov, guilty, libel, Nodyr Akrabov, pardoned, Russia, Sergei Mayorov, Uzbekistan, Vladimir Berezovskiy,
September 30th, 2010
Human rights campaigner Surat Ikramov was
found guilty on libel charges on 28 September for an article he published about the suspicious death of singer Dilnura Kadyrjanova in 2007.
Ikramov, head of the Initiative Group of Independent Human Rights Activists of Uzbekistan, was fined 100,000 som (around $60) and ordered to publicly refute the article by publishing approved corrections. Authorities claimed the death of Kadyrjanova, who had been the mistress of a prominent police chief, was suicide. Ikramov’s report suggested that the police chief had used his position of power to prevent a full murder investigation.
September 17th, 2010
Voice of America correspondent Abdulmalik Boboyev is facing between five and eight years in prison on
four charges in Uzbekistan’s capital Tashkent, by prosecutors brought against him on 13 September. Three of the charges relate to his work as a journalist: “defamation” , “insult” and “preparing and disseminating material constituting a threat to public order and security”.
Boboyev has also been charged with “illegal entry into the country” and has been banned from going abroad.
