Tag Archives: rights and freedoms

Kazakhstan plans to return men to China

DEC. 7 (The Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee said that two ethnic Kazakhs who crossed over from China’s western Xinjiang province illegally to escape what they said was the persecution of Muslim minorities will be returned to the Chinese authorities. A court case against Kaster Musakhan and Murager Alimuly for crossing the border illegally in October is due to begin soon but Darkhan Dilmanov, deputy head of Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee has already said that they have “no chance” of staying.
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— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019

Armenia wants to arrest former Prosecutor-General

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DEC. 3 (The Bulletin) — Prosecutors in Armenia put out an arrest warrant for Gevorg Kostanyan, Armenia’s former Prosecutor-General, in connection with the ongoing trials of several former top officials, including former president Robert Kocharyan, for the shooting dead of 14 people at a post-election demonstration in 2008. Mr Kostanyan now lives in Moscow. Critics of the prosecution of the former senior officials said that the government of PM Nikol Pashinyan was pursuing political vendettas.
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— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019

Kyrgyz feminist exhibition organiser quits after death threats

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BISHKEK/Dec. 3 (The Bulletin) –Mira Dzhangaracheva, the director of Kyrgyzstan’s National Museum of Fine Arts, said that she had resigned her position after receiving deaths threats links to a feminist exhibition.

The exhibition, called Feminale, which has been shown in the museum since Nov. 28, has shocked most ordinary Kyrgyz. Dedicated to the 17 Kyrgyz migrant women workers who died in a fire in 2016 at the Moscow printing house they were working in, the exhibition’s organisers said that their mission was to promote women’s rights in Kyrgyzstan’s staunchly macho and conservative society.

Exhibits included a boxing punch bag shaped like the torso of a woman, a Danish performance artist wandering around a room naked and various references to nudity.

But while the show has earned praise from Bishkek’s younger, liberal-minded millennials, it has also generated criticism. Delegations of Kyrgyz elders have visited government offices to demand that the show is closed. Employees of the museum and artists, including Ms Dzhangaracheva, said that they have received death threats.

The government stepped in and removed some of the more provocative exhibits, the ones it said showed “nude women in a temple of art”.

Now, Ms Dzhangaracheva , the National Fine Art Museum director, has said that it is safer for her to quit rather than try to see off the conservatives who she said have stymied artistic expression in Kyrgyzstan.

“Over the past five days there have been so many threats to me personally and my employees and to the organisers of this Feminale that I worry about our people,” she told the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty website in an interview.

Women, gay and minorities’ rights in Kyrgyzstan have been worsening according to activists.
Human Rights Watch said of the government’s decision to block part of the Feminale exhibition: “Rather than limiting public access to thought-provoking art, the Kyrgyz government should protect its creators against threats of violence and support freedom of expression, including about women’s rights.”
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— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019

Aliyev delivers anti-Europe speech

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NOV. 27 (The Bulletin) — In a speech at a university in Baku, Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev said that he wasn’t seeking closer integration with Europe because it didn’t respect Islamic values, Bloomberg News reported. Relations between Azerbaijan and Europe have been strained for the past few years with European politicians accusing Azerbaijan of cracking down on civil liberties and promoting corruption. Next year Azerbaijan is dues to supply central Europe with gas from its Caspian Sea fields.
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— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Freedom House says free speech has dropped in Kazakhstan

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NOV. 4 (The Bulletin) — US NGO Freedom House said that free speech in Kazakhstan, alongside Sudan and Brazil, had deteriorated rapidly over the past 12 months. It said that the drop in free speech coincided with the handover of power from Nursultan Nazarbayev to Kassym-Jomart Tokayev and that the government had tried to “monopolise the mobile market and implement real-time electronic surveillance”.

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— This story was first published in issue 428 of the weekly Bulletin

Nationalists in Tbilisi attack people queuing to watch gay film

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TBILISI/Nov. 8 (The Bulletin) — Right-wing nationalists in Georgia clashed with police outside a cinema in Tbilisi that was screening a film about a homosexual love affair.

At least one person was injured when protesters threw rocks at people queuing to watch the film at the Amirani cinema in central Tbilisi. Police dressed in riot gear arrested at least 20 people.

Eyewitnesses said that hundreds of anti-gay rights demonstrators blocked the road leading to the cinema.

“Long live Georgia!” and “Shame!” they shouted. Some demonstrators burnt a rainbow flag, a symbol of gay pride. Many were holding crosses. The Orthodox Church, a powerful institution in Georgia, has denounced the film.

The Swedish-Georgian film ‘And then we danced’ documents a love affair between two male ballet dancers in Georgia’s national ballet. The film shows the difficulties of conducting a gay relationship in Georgia where conservative values are rooted into society.

Far-right supporters in Georgia have attacked Gay Pride events in Georgia previously and also targeted foreigners. Although the government and most of the population wants to join the EU, Georgia also has a reputation for sustaining a society which is suspicious of reform.

Critics of the ruling Georgian Dream government have accused it of not doing enough to clamp down in homophobic sentiment in Georgian society. It has previously been supported by the Georgian Orthodox Church and also by nationalist parties.

On his Facebook page, the film’s director, Levan Akin, wrote that these were “dark times”. “Some far right groups and the Church have basically condemned the film and are planning to stop people from entering the sold out screenings,” he wrote.

‘And then we danced’ was released in Europe May and has won numerous awards.

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— This story was first published in issue 428 of the weekly Bulletin.

Belarus refuses to extradite journalist to Tajikistan

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NOV. 6 (The Bulletin) — The authorities in Belarus refused an extradition request made by the Tajik government for opposition activist Farhod Odinaev because of potential torture concerns. The Belarussian authorities had arrested Mr Odinaev in September as he travelled from Russia to Poland for a conference. Mr Odinaev had been a member of the now-banned Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan.

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— This story was first published in issue 428 of the weekly Bulletin

Kazakh police stand aside for protest

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NOV. 9 (The Bulletin) –The authorities in Kazakhstan monitored, but did not intercept, an unsanctioned protest in Almaty organised by the Oyan, Qazaqstan group wants the system of government to switch towards a parliamentary democracy and for political prisoners to be released. It is rare for police not to detain protesters at unsanctioned protests. This year there has been an increase in the number of protests in Kazakhstan.

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— This story was first published in issue 428 of the weekly Bulletin

Turkmen doctor retracts statement that he is gay

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NOV. 6 (The Bulletin) — A Turkmen doctor who came out as gay on a video broadcast by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has recanted the information and said that it was falsised. Three days after coming out as gay, Kasymberdy Garayev, was summoned to a police station in Ashgabat. He left the following day and immediately distance himself from his earlier comments. Homosexuality is illegal in Turkmenistan.

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— This story was first published in issue 428 of the weekly Bulletin

Kyrgyz court keeps Uzbek human rights work in prison

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July 30 (The Bulletin) — A court in Bishkek upheld a life prison sentence handed down to human rights activist Azimjan Askarov. Askarov, a 68-year-old ethnic Uzbek, was arrested after ethnic violence in 2010 in Osh killed several hundred people. He was blamed for stoking the violence. His supporters have said that ethnic Uzbeks were the target of the violence and that Askarov has been made a scapegoat.
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— This story was first published in issue 418 of the weekly Bulletin