On the morning of 19 September 2013, a group of unidentified women threatened and harassed the organisers of human rights film festival “Bir Duino Kyrgyzstan” (One World Kyrgyzstan) demanding that the documentary about imprisoned human rights defender Azimjan Askarov – produced by Freedom House –should not be projected. The film festival opened in Bishkek on 18 September 2013. The annual film festival is organised by human rights group Bir-Duino Kyrzystan, led by human rights defender Ms Tolekan Ismailova, the director of Human Rights Centre ‘Citizens Against Corruption’.
Azimjan Askarov is a human rights defender who spent 25 years documenting human rights abuses in Kyrgyzstan until his arrest in 2010. He is currently serving a life sentence after an unfair trial during which he was beaten in detention and denied access to his lawyer. The film festival organisers do not share the opinion of some politicians that he film could provoke inter-ethnic clashes
[On 28 September 2012, at previous festival edition, the organisers were banned from screening a documentary on the experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in the Islamic world, after a complaint was lodged by the Prosecutor’s Office, which considered the film to be “extremist, inciting religious hatred and aimed at dishonouring Muslims”. Following this decision, Tolekan Ismailova was targeted with a defamation campaign in the media and the Human Rights Centre ‘Citizens Against Corruption’ received threats. Front Line Defenders issued an urgent appeal on this case on 19 October 2012 http://www.frontlinedefenders.org/node/20249, and an update on 4 December 2012 http://www.frontlinedefenders.org/node/21003%5D
The Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) in Bangladesh, a member of the Law Commission, and several rights activists and academics said on Saturday 28 september that the state should not treat human rights defenders as its enemy. They also expressed concern over the use of several laws against human rights defenders Read the rest of this entry »
In the context of reprisals here is a report from Panorama concerning Azerbaijan, admittedly from an Armenian news source: Read the rest of this entry »
On 27 September 2013, Karaganda’s regional court of Karaganda confirmed the decision of the Balkhash Court to approve the forced psychiatric confinement of human rights defender and lawyer Zinaida Mukhortova on which this blog reported earlier. Read the rest of this entry »
The Ahlul Bayt News Agency reports today that a court in Bahrain sentenced today political detainees, including activists and human rights defenders, to total of more than 400 years’ imprisonment and upheld the sentence of 10 years’ imprisonment against two children. All of the sentences were delivered under the internationally criticized and vague terrorism law. The court also reduced the sentences of two police officers who tortured a detainee to death from 10 years’, to 2 years’ imprisonment. On 29 of September 2013, the court held the ruling session in the case known as “February 14th Coalition”, in which 50 individuals were tried under the terrorism law, including human rights defender Naji Fateel, political activist Hisham Al-Sabbag and activist Rihanna Al-Mosawi. In first session when defendants spoke about the torture they were subjected to, but were ignored by the court. On the 5th of September, the legal defense team submitted a letter requesting a change of court due to the conflict of interest, and requested a medical committee to investigate the torture allegations from the defendants. The defense team then withdrew from the session based on Article 211 of the Criminal Procedure Law of Bahrain, which stated that the defense team can refuse the judges ruling in the cases mentioned in the previous article and in other cases which are prescribed by the law. Moreover, the defendants issued a statement boycotting the trial stating that the lack of an independent judiciary as one of the reasons. On the 29 September 2013, the court continued the trial and sentenced the 50 defendants in the case to a total of 430 years in prison: 16 defendants were sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment including Naji Fateel and political activist Hisham Al-Sabbag, 4 were sentenced to 10 years imprisonment and 30 to 5 years. The BCHRs Acting President Maryam Al-Khawaja stated: “There was no due process in the entirety of this case which is why the defendants and their lawyers decided to boycott. From the time that the defendants were abducted, tortured and then sentences, nothing was done according to international standards of a fair trial. If these fifty people were really guilty of a crime, why was the only evidence presented confessions extracted under torture? This was a sham trial with a political verdict, they should be released immediately”.
(Kristi Pinderi, LGBT activist from Albania, with Natalia Bracelet)
Stockholm-based Civil Rights Defenders announced today, 27 September 2013, that Kristi Pinderi, LGBT activist from Albania, will be one of the first human rights defenders to be included in the Natalia Project security system. His bracelet is activated just in time Read the rest of this entry »
In five days from now, on 2 October 2013, the People’s Court in Hanoi, Viet Nam, will hear the case of human rights defender Le Quoc Quan, who has been held in detention since 27 December 2012 and whose trial was postponed on 8 July 2013. Le Quoc Quan is a prominent lawyer, blogger and human rights defender. He has a long history of being targeted by the Vietnamese authorities in retaliation for his work. As a lawyer, he represented many victims of human rights violations, but was disbarred in 2007 on suspicion of engaging in “activities to overthrow the regime”. Le Quoc Quan also runs a blog http://lequocquan.blogspot.ie/ where he writes about various issues including civil rights, political pluralism and religious freedom. On 27 December 2012, Le Quoc Quan was arrested on trumped up allegations of tax evasion, was held incommunicado for the first two months and spent fifteen days on hunger strike. Currently the human rights defender remains imprisoned awaiting trial.
In what could possibly put trafficking campaigners and human rights organisations on a collision course, the Uzbekistan authorities have recourse to trafficking and sexual harassment charges to put human rights defenders behind bars. Read the rest of this entry »
Former political prisoner Vasil Parfiankou has been placed in medical and labor dispensary No. 1 in the town of Svetlahorsk, after serving five days of arrest in Minsk. The Human Rights Center “Viasna”Read the rest of this entry »
