DUSHANBE — The chief editor of an independent Tajik newspaper says he and his relatives were beaten by unknown attackers while going to celebrate Eid al-Fitr, RFE/RL’s Tajik Service reports.

Khurshed Atovullo, editor of the weekly «Farazh,» told RFE/RL he was driving to a friend’s home in Dushanbe on August 31 when a car blocked the road and forced him to stop.

Three people armed with clubs then attacked him, his brother, and his brother-in-law, who were with him.

Atovullo added that at least four more people waiting for them in Dushanbe’s Zarafshon-2 district joined the first group of assailants. He said the men did not give a reason for the attack.

Qaysiddin Aliev, the officer on duty in Dushanbe’s Sino-2 police station, said his station took a statement from Atovullo about the attack. Aliev added that Atovullo was sent for a medical check-up and the police were waiting for the results before launching an investigation.

Aliev said it should be easy to detain the attackers because Atovullo saw the license-plate number of the assailants’ car.

Nuriddin Qarshiboev, the head of National Association of Independent Media of Tajikistan, deplored the attack on Atovullo.

Qarshiboev said if there was evidence that Atovullo was beaten for being a journalist then the association would offer him legal advice.

«Farazh» and two other independent weeklies were effectively closed down for three weeks in October after not being allowed to use any printing facilities, reportedly on orders from government officials displeased by what they called «aggressive» coverage of military operations in the eastern Rasht Valley last year.

The U.S., British, French, and German ambassadors and the head of a European Union delegation cited that printing-access deprivation when expressing concerns to the Tajik Foreign Ministry in the fall about the state of media freedom in the country.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Davlat Nazriev told RFE/RL late last year that the government did not issue a ban on the printing of the newspapers. The pressure on «Farazh» was subsequently lifted.

In April, a legal dispute between three Supreme Court judges and three independent newspapers — including «Farazh» — was settled out of court after more than a year of dispute.

The case began in January 2010 when the newspapers «Ozodagon,» «Farazh,» and «Asia Plus» published a statement by lawyer Solehjon Juraev accusing the Supreme Court of corruption.

Atovullo was also attacked and nearly killed by unknown attackers in 1995 when he worked as a journalist.

http://www.rferl.org/content/tajik_editor_attacked_in_dushanbe/24314137.html

ENG: http://en.rsf.org/no-one-shall-be-subjected-to-30-08-2011,40875.html

FRA: http://fr.rsf.org/nul-ne-sera-soumis-a-une-30-08-2011,40874.html?var_mode=calcul

«No one shall be subjected to enforced disappearance»

As the world marks International Day of the Disappeared today, Reporters Without Borders notes that many countries are still violating international law on this matter, including the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, which the UN General Assembly adopted in 2006.

Reporters Without Borders calls for the universal ratification of this convention, which has so far been signed by 91 countries and ratified by 29. Combating enforced disappearance is vital in the struggle against dictatorships and arbitrary rule.

Enforced disappearance includes both secret imprisonment and secret house arrest, in which the families of the victims are denied any information about their fate or where they are being held. It is a form of abduction and sometimes ends in murder.

It is a radical method of oppression in which human rights defenders, opposition activists, free speech activists and independent journalists are removed from society because they are often on the front line of the struggle against authoritarian regimes. As well censoring calls for freedom and justice, dictatorships target those who make the calls.

Enforced disappearances, which contravene international law and often the law of the countries where they take place, must be condemned firmly. Without an effective struggle against this evil, without binding measures that require respect for the basic legal rules on arrest and detention, any improvement in fundamental freedoms is impossible. The widespread or systematic practice of enforced disappearance is a crime against humanity. The prosecution of those responsible should be a priority.

Article 2 of the convention defines “enforced disappearance” as “the arrest, detention, abduction or any other form of deprivation of liberty by agents of the state or by persons or groups of persons acting with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the state, followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or by concealment of the fate or whereabouts of the disappeared person, which place such a person outside the protection of the law.”

Iran and China have turned enforced disappearance into a favoured method of censoring free speech. The uprisings in Libya and Syria have led to extra-judicial arrests of many journalists. Mexico has many cases of unsolved disappearances of journalists. The inhumane prison conditions in Eritrea, a small country forgotten by the international community, must be condemned. And finally, disappearances are also common in Pakistan, the world’s most dangerous country for journalists. Reporters Without Borders highlights several key cases below.

IRAN

Human rights and pro-democracy activist Pirouz Davani, editor of the paper Pirouz, vanished in late August 1998. The paper Kar-e-Karagar said on 28 November that year he had been executed. Akbar Ganji, of Sobh-é-Emrouz, who was investigating the case, confirmed this in late November 2000 and accused the then prosecutor of the special ecclesiastical court, Mohseni Ejehi, (the current prosecutor-general) of being involved in his death. The judiciary has not investigated.

Journalist Kouhyar Goudarzi has been held in secret since 1 August 2011 for unknown reasons and justice officials have not said where he is being held.

CHINA

Human rights campaigner Govruud Huuchinhuu, of the Southern Mongolian Democratic Alliance (SMDA), has been missing since she was released on 27 January 2011 from Tongliao hospital (通辽), Inner Mongolia (northern China), where she was being treated for cancer. She had been under house arrest since November 2010 for urging online that Mongolian dissidents celebrate the release of journalist and cyberdissident Hada, who heads the SDMA and defends China’s Mongolian minority. Officials say he was freed after more than 15 years at the end of his sentence on 10 December 2010 but he is still in prison. There has been no news of him for several weeks.

PAKISTAN

Journalist Rehmatullah Darpakhel was kidnapped in North Waziristan on 11 August 2011.

SRI LANKA

Prageeth Ekneligoda, journalist and cartoonist with Lankaenews, vanished in Colombo on 24 January 2010. No progress has been made in efforts to find him.

ERITREA

Most of the 30 or so journalists in prison are considered to have disappeared because of the problems of finding them and the regime’s refusal to give any information about where they are and their state of health. The best known is Dawit Isaac, founder of the now-closed weekly Setit and holding dual Eritrean and Swedish nationality, who since his arrest on 23 September 2001 has alternated between prison and hospital spells in the capital, Asmara. He was transferred in 2009 from a provincial prison in Embatkala to the air force hospital in Asmara, where he was treated for several months. Then he vanished and nobody has been allowed to visit him. He may be in Asmara’s Karchelle prison or in the Eiraeiro prison, northeast of the capital.

Other vanished journalists include the editor and co-founder of the fortnightly Meqaleh, Mattewos Habteab, arrested in Asmara on 19 September 2001, and sports writer Temesgen Gebreyesus, of the fortnightly Keste Debena, who was arrested the next day.

MEXICO

Journalist María Esther Aguilar Cansimbe, of the daily papers Diario de Zamora and Cambio de Michoacán (in the southwestern state of Michoacán), disappeared in 2009. Marco Antonio López Ortiz, news editor of the Acapulco paper El Sur (in the southwestern state of Guerrero), vanished in June 2011. No official investigation has produced any results.

MIDDLE EAST

Many foreign and Libyan journalists were detained for several days by supporters of the Gaddafi regime with no news of where they were being held or their conditions of detention. Disappearances are also frequent in Syria of journalists, activists and witnesses to the repression by the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.

http://en.rsf.org/no-one-shall-be-subjected-to-30-08-2011,40875.html

AQTOBE, Kazakhstan — A rights activist and RFE/RL reporter in northwestern Kazakhstan has been acquitted of libel, RFE/RL’s Kazakh Service reports.

Alima Abdirova was sued by the former director of a special-needs boarding school in Aqtobe after she alleged children there were being abused. The allegations were published in a local newspaper in May.

Abdirova told RFE/RL that Judge Maqsat Duisen dropped the libel charges against her on August 31, saying they «have not been proven in court.»

Abdirova was sued in her capacity as a member of the independent Kazakh Bureau for Human Rights, not as a journalist.

Irina Dombrovskaya, the school’s former director, maintained that Abdirova’s portrayal of conditions at the school was distorted and inaccurate.

Dombrovskaya also demanded 5 million tenges (about $34,000) in moral damages and 60,000 tenges (about $400) for court costs.

http://www.rferl.org/content/kazakh_reporter_activist_acquitted_of_libel/24314086.html

In August 2011, the NANSMIT Monitoring Service received 25 reports. Four of them describe the factual situation in the media in the light of socio-legal and political environment; fourteen reports describe direct violations of rights of media professionals; and seven reports describe conflicts and accusations against the media and journalists.

I. POLITICAL, SOCIAL, ADMINISTRATIVE AND LEGAL CLIMATE IN THE COUNTRY DEFINING THE FACTUAL SITUATION IN THE MEDIA

1. Public speeches and statements of superior officials defining the factual situation in the mass media

2 August
Dodihudo Saimiddinov, chairman, the government Committee on Language and Terminology, Dushanbe

Professor Dodihudo Saimiddinov, chairman of the government Committee on Language and mistreated a correspondent of the Ozodagon weekly Ibodullokhi Tohir. The official pushed the journalist out of his office and refused to answer his questions.

According to Ozodagon, the journalist spent two hours in chairman’s waiting-room. When, eventually, he entered his premises and asked to share comments about the absence of Tajik computer keyboards, the bureaucrat yelled, “I have no spare time to talk with you! Close the door behind you!” The journalist was insistent, and the official made comments about his appearance, “How dare you to come to a public servant without a suit and tie?”

2. Factual situation in the media

13 August
Barzu Abdurazakov, theater director, Dushanbe

A well-known Tajik theater director Barzu Abdurazakov told Radio Ozodi (Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty) that he does not watch Tajik TV programs.
“I do not watch TVT anymore. Once, I switched on the TV set, and I had a feeling that somebody tries to convince me that I am stupid. All TV programs have the very same message: “you are a full, and let us teach you something”. I would have kept silent unless our television did not broadcast through the satellite. The whole World has access to it, and this is a disgrace for the nation…”

“I watch TV – there’s no freedom; I read newspapers – no freedom either. If I want to stage a new play it is filtered through dozens of public offices. At present, censorship in Tajikistan is worse than it was in the Soviet time, even in 1937”.

3. Journalists protecting their civil and professional rights

5 August
All media, Dushanbe

On 5 August, the Center for Countering Corruption and Promotion of Education (CCPE) and the Tajik National Association of Independent Mass Media (NANSMIT) held a round table on the topic “Ignoring applications of citizens is a manifestation of corruption in the government”. The event in Dushanbe was attended by government officials, human rights organizations, independent experts and the mass media.
Participants discussed the issues of legal application to the authorities at different levels as a mechanism for decision making, and other relevant problems.

The round table resulted in recommendations developed by participants for the government of Tajikistan.

23 August
Association of media producers and distributors of TV and radio products, Dushanbe

A new media association is created in Dushanbe – the Association of Media Producers and Distributors of TV and Radio Products.

The main goal of the new organization is protection of producers of broadcasting contents. According to the director Zinatullo Ismoilov, the Association is founded by the following Tajik entities: TV SMT, TV Regar, TV Mavji Ozod, TV 5 in Kanibadam, TV Simo in Penjikent, Independent TV & Radio in Kurgan-Tube, and Oriyono Media.

BY 2015, according to the international conventions and treaties, Tajikistan, along with other 100 countries must switch to digital broadcasting. In this regard, the Association should protect the interests and render assistance to private TV and radio companies in the country.

II. VIOLATION OF PROFESSIONAL RIGHTS

1. Criminal persecution of a journalist

22 August
Urunboi Usmanov, BBC, Khujand

According to Faizinisso Vakhidova, the lawyer of Urunboi Usmanov, correspondent of BBC in Sughd province, the Tajik law enforcement agencies applied tortures to her defendant. Usmonov himself made this statement at the court hearing on 18 August.

“Usmonov had open wounds upon eyebrows and hands, but the judge was not interested from the defendant about that,” — said Vakhidova. The lawyer added that the judge Shohidon Nazarov did not respond to Usmonov’s verbal complaint about the tortures.

22 August
Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)

The US-based organization Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) calls the Tajik authorities to reject a trumped-up charge against Urunboi Usmanov, the BBC correspondent in Sughd province.
On 22 August, CPJ released a statement saying that the reporter is charged with participation in the illegal extremist group Hisb-ut-Tahrir. According to Usmonov’s lawyer Faizinisso Vakhidova, the journalist might receive a lengthy prison term on these charges.

Robert Mahoney, director of CPJ said that the charges against Usmonov are absurd since a journalist in line of duty has the right to communicate with any groups including those opposing the government.

26 August
Urunboi Usmonov, BBC, Khujand

Malohat Abduazimova, the spouse of the BBC correspondent Urunboi Usmonov told the court on 26 August that her husband was beaten by law enforcement officers on 13 August, on the day he was arrested.
On that day he did not return home. Relatives were looking for home everywhere, but his telephone was silent. On the next day, he came home accompanied by four national security officers.

The judge asked Abduazimova whether she applied to the law enforcement agencies to raise concern about the beating of her husband. The lady answered negatively explaining that Usmonov was kept in the detention facility, i.e. was under control of the law enforcement unit.

26 August
Amnesty International, London

On 24 August, the international human rights organization Amnesty International issued a press release expressing concern over the arrest of Urunboi Usmonov, correspondent of BBC in Sughd province.

The press release says, “Amnesty International is concerned that BBC journalist Urunboy Usmonov faces up to five years’ imprisonment on charges believed to relate to his professional activities. To the organization’s knowledge, no investigation has yet been carried out into allegations that he was tortured and ill-treated in pre-trial detention. The judge has reportedly yet to inquire into how he and his four co-defendants have been treated in pre-trial detention”.

The full text of the press release is available here: http://www.eng.nansmit.tj/news/?id=736

2. Violation of publicity of court proceeding

16 August
Shohidon Nazarov, deputy chairman of the Sughd province court, Khujand

Deputy chairman of the Sughd province court Shohidon Nazarov told the media that he can admit only two journalists to the court hearings on the case of Urunboi Usmanov, the BBC correspondent. He added that the journalists must preliminary receive a special permission from the province prosecutor.

Август, 18
Все СМИ

On 18 August, chairman of the Tajik National Association of Independent Mass Media (NANSMIT) Nuriddin Karshiboev met with the chairman of the court in Sughd province Naim Mansurov to express concern over the issue of violation of publicity in court proceeding.

Mansurov explained that, probably, the statement of his subordinate was misunderstood. “We take all necessary measures to ensure access of the media to the court hearings”, — said the official.

3. Violation of criminal-procedural standards

22 August
Urunboi Usmonov, BBC, Khujand

Faizinisso Vakhidova, the lawyer of the BBC correspondent Urunboi Usmonov is going to solicit about an interrogation of Ulugbek Mustafokulov, the judge of the city court in Khujand who had to verify the defendant’s waiving of the lawyer’s services.

“The judge had to crosscheck Usmonov’s statement. The defendant has no skills in jurisprudence. He is an ethnic Uzbek, and does not properly understand the Tajik language. He had to be provided with a lawyer even without his consent”, — she said.

“Secondly, the judge did not check the date of Usmonov’s registered arrest against the factual detention, and the difference is one day”, — added Vakhidova.

Usmonov is accused of “a failure to report a crime” and “participation in activities of a political party, public or religious organization banned on the territory of Tajikistan”.

4. Threat (Article 120 of Tajikistan’s Criminal Code)

22 August
Asia Plus weekly, Dushanbe

Shukhyrat Kudratov and Abdurakhmon Sharipov, lawyers of the Asia Plus weekly told Radio Ozodi that an officer from the State Unit on Countering Organized Crime Valikhon Mulloev insulted and threatened them. The lawyers came to hearings at the Firdausi district court in Dushanbe; Mulloev approached them saying, “You are the enemies of the law enforcement structures. I wish I would shoot you in the forehead, and I will find the way to destroy you”.
The lawyers say that Mulloev repeated his threats several times, and there werse some witnesses who can confirm this. They applied to the office of Prosecutor General soliciting support and protection from Mulloev who has access to firearms.

Mulloev represents the interests of Anvar Tagoimurodov, deputy Minister of Interior. A few months ago, Asia Plus published an article revealing facts of tortures by certain law enforcement officers, after which the deputy minister filed a suit against Asia Plus accusing the newspaper of libel and defamation.
On 22 August, the deputy prosecutor general Abdukodir Muhammadiev had a meeting with the Asia Plus lawyer Shukhrat Kudratov. The official said that the complaint is accepted and passed to a special prosecutor general’s unit in charge of line-of-duty investigations.

26 August
US Embassy in Dushanbe

The embassy of the United States in Dushanbe is concerned about the threats by an Interior Ministry official against the lawyers of Asia Plus weekly.
“If these threats are real, such kind of actions must be investigated and presented in court to ensure the integrity of the national law enforcement system”, — says the statement issued on 26 August.

5. Ungrounded limitation of access to information

3 August
Kh. Tagoimurodov, head of the government antimonopoly service, Dushanbe

The Farazh weekly continued a discussion around the activities of the government antimonopoly service and its head, Mr. Tagoimurodov. This government structure has the duty of ensuring healthy competition in Tajikistan’s markets as well as faier and equal attitude to all market players regardless of their forms of property.

The agency has been repeatedly criticized for violations of these provisions. Farazh has published a number of articles criticizing the antimonopoly agency; however, none of its officials has responded to the publications.

III. CONFLICTS, VIOLATIONS INCRIMINATED TO THE MEDIA AND JOURNALISTS

1. Accusation of participation in an illegal religious extremist organization

August 16
Urunboi Usmonov, correspondent, BBC, Khujand

On 16 August 2011, the court in the Tajik northern city of Khujand started hearings on the case of Urunboi Usmanov, correspondent of the Uzbek service of BBC in Sughd province. The journalist is accused of participation in an illegal religious extremist organization.

Detailed information on the case of Usmonov is available here:
http://www.eng.nansmit.tj/news/?id=730
http://www.eng.nansmit.tj/news/?id=735
http://www.eng.nansmit.tj/news/?id=736
http://www.eng.nansmit.tj/news/?id=740

2. Protection of honor, dignity and business reputation

4 August
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Dushanbe

On 4 August, the correspondent of the analytical online outlet EurasiaNet.org was invited to the Tajik Ministry of Foreign Affairs for a discussion regarding his article Tajikistan:Dushanbe Keeping Russia at Arm’s Length http://www.eurasianet.org/node/63978.

Konstantin Parshin told the NANSMIT monitoring service that the head of the ministry’s information department Davlatali Nazriev complained about misinformation in the article, namely, there was a segment telling about Tajikistan’s demand of payment for Russia’s military presence in the country.

Konstantin Parshin explained that the segment was added by the editor in charge of the final version of the article. The editor made only one mistake – he did not provided a link to the initial source of information.

In reality, the allegations and statements about Tajikistan’s demand of payment from Russia had been published by a number of Russian media including the state-owned RIA Novosti.

It should be also noted that many Tajik correspondents working for foreign media outlets have had problems after “reprints” in online portals. The most “famous” in this regard is Centrasia.ru, which very often changes headlines and contents of original articles, although leaving bylines unchanged.

23 August
Abdulgafur Orzu, ambassador of Afghanistan in Dushanbe

The ambassador of Afghanistan in Dushanbe Abdulgafur Orzu решительно refuted a publication in the Avesta news agency saying that Afghanistan rejected the proposal on export of Tajikistan’s electricity.

The diplomat said that such publications raise concern on the eve of the 20-th anniversary of Tajikistan and the forthcoming visit of Khamid Karzai, the president of Afghanistan. (Millat weekly, #34, 24.08.2011).

3. Violation of ethical norms in journalism

18 August
The Media Council of Tajikistan, Dushanbe

The Media Council of Tajikistan acknowledged that publications on the web site Pressa.tj and in the newspapers Narodnaya Gazeta regarding the arrest of Urunboi Usmonov are not in compliance with the ethical code of journalists.
Members of the Council stated that Narodnaya Gazeta in its publication used the words like “pseudo-journalist” and “extremist”, thus violating Article 7 of the Ethical Code. Only the court can define whether the person in question is an extremist or he is not. Article 8 of the Code also contains provisions on presumption of innocence. This Article, inter alia, says that journalists must restrain from their own judgment in their writing.
This report is based on compiled materials from the media and private information presented by correspondents of the NANSMIT Monitoring Network

Coordinator of the Monitoring Service
Abdufattokh Vokhidov

Project Manager
Nuriddin Karshibaev

From October 2011 the international media NGO, International Media Support, will run a two and a half year programme in Tajikistan with various media projects focussing on support and professionalization of media, youth and media, capacity building of local media organizations and coordination of media activities with other international media NGOs.

International Media Support (IMS) seeks a Programme Manager to manage these media projects and to react to sudden future needs in the media environment of Tajikistan.

The Programme Manager must live in Tajikistan and work from there in close collaboration with local partners and IMS head quarters in Denmark, Department for Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia.

The Programme Manager is expected to work closely together with IMS’ local umbrella partner, NANSMIT and work from the office of NANSMIT.

The IMS Programme Manager in Tajikistan will be responsible for the IMS projects in Tajikistan, including the following tasks:

1. To become completely familiarized with the IMS projects in Tajikistan, budget, objectives, results and the time-frame in which the projects will take place (grant-administration and project cycle management).

2. To locally manage and coordinate all IMS projects in Tajikistan in close cooperation with IMS’ local partners and to assess sudden needs of IMS involvement in non-planned activities.

3. To make sure, that all IMS projects are carried out professionally, efficient and at reasonable economic costs in accordance with the budget-lines allocated.

4. To monitor the results of the IMS projects in Tajikistan in accordance with the planned outputs.

5. To support the project management of NANSMIT (the umbrella partner of IMS in Tajikistan) and to monitor the results of the projects led by NANSMIT on behalf of IMS.

6. To function as a communication link and coordinator between IMS and relevant local and international media/development organisations located in Tajikistan.

7. To manage the project budgets and to pay local staff who are working for IMS (e.g. short term experts).

8. To closely follow and monitor the media development in Tajikistan and to follow and monitor the overall political situation in the country (to the extent needed for media-development purposes).

9. To deliver qualified written input on the political development, the media development and the IMS projects in Tajikistan every half year for bi-annual reports to IMS’ back-donor and/or to report to IMS on the above listed tasks when required and needed.

10.To participate in a Skype meeting every 2nd week with IMS HQ.

Qualifications of the programme officer:

1. Relevant educational background (in journalism, international relations, communications, politics, business, business administration, cultural studies, or similar academic studies).

2. Preferably at least 3 years of professional experience in development assistance.

3. Preferably documented experience with project management.

4. Interest in and knowledge about media.

5. Knowledge about Tajik and Central Asian politics – and a sensitive flair of the present political development and potential conflicts.

6. Neutral, fair and balanced regarding possible political, religious and social conflicts in Tajikistan.

7. Extensive communicative and cooperative skills.

8. Extensive network in the Tajik society.

9. Efficient, constructive and solution oriented.

10. Preferably experience with or from CIS countries.

11. Fluent in Tajik and English and knowledge of Russian.

The salary will be negotiated according to qualifications.

The start of the job is preferably October 2011.

The work place will be at the office of NANSMIT: 34, Huseinzoda str, Dushanbe city, Tajikistan

Deadline for applications: September 20 2011.

More information about the job at:

NANSMIT: Nurridin Karshiboev, phone: (+992 37) 221-37-11, (992 93) 504 30 13(mobile), e-mail: knuriddin@yandex.ru , or at Henrik Hansen, International Media Support (hkh@i-m-s.dk or skype: henrikkeith)

www.nansmit.tj

International Media Support Is Seeking a Program Manager to manage media projects in Tajikistan.

From October 2011 the international media NGO, International Media Support, will run a two and a half year program in Tajikistan with various media projects focusing on support and professionalization of media, youth and media, capacity building of local media organizations and coordination of media activities with other international media NGOs.

International Media Support (IMS) seeks a Programme Manager to manage these media projects and to react to sudden future needs in the media environment of Tajikistan.

The Program Manager must live in Tajikistan and work from there in close collaboration with local partners and IMS head quarters in Denmark, Department for Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia.

The Program Manager is expected to work closely together with IMS’ local umbrella partner, NANSMIT and work from the office of NANSMIT.

For more information click here: [url=http://www.eng.nansmit.tj/?page=events&id=4]http://www.eng.nansmit.tj/?page=events&id=4[/url]

Dushanbe, Tajikistan, August 26, 2011

The Embassy of the United States of America is concerned with alleged threats made by an officer of the Ministry of Internal Affairs’ (MVD) Department for Combating Organized Crime against lawyers representing Asia-Plus.

If true, this type of action has no place in a court of law, and the incident must be investigated to preserve the integrity of the legal system.

We view the announcement by the MVD that it has launched an internal investigation as a positive step.

We urge the Office of the Prosecutor to view the allegations seriously, investigate them thoroughly, and take appropriate action based upon the results of the investigation.

http://dushanbe.usembassy.gov/

KHUJAND, Tajikistan — Lawyers for a BBC journalist on trial in Tajikistan on charges of associating with a banned Islamic group say officials have acknowledged there were procedural violations during his arrest and detention, RFE/RL’s Tajik Service reports.

Urunboy Usmonov, 59, was arrested in June and went on trial last week over his alleged links to Hizb ut-Tahrir.

Usmonov and his employer have denied any wrongdoing, saying any meetings he had with the group members were for purely journalistic purposes.

Usmonov’s lawyers quoted Khurshed Ghiyosov, head of the State Committee for National Security investigations department in Sughd Province, as saying on August 26 that Usmonov should have been provided with a lawyer immediately after his arrest, and a search of his home was not legal.

Usmonov’s wife, Malohat Abduazimova, who was invited to attend the court hearing, said that when security officers brought Usmonov with them on June 14 to search the family home there were visible signs of a beating on his head and face.

But representatives of the investigation team categorically deny beating Usmonov. They said that when Usmonov was freed from detention on July 14, he gave them a written statement that he was not beaten at the time of his arrest.

Usmonov’s lawyer Fayzinso Vohidova said he wrote that statement word by word under pressure from the prosecutors’ office simply to secure his release from detention. Vohidova claimed that investigators did not allow Usmonov to meet with his lawyers for nine days after his arrest, until the marks from the beating had disappeared.

Vohidova said the group of security agents who arrested Usmonov and searched his home acted illegally, because under Tajik law this is the task of investigators. For that reason, Vohidova said, the materials the security agents took from Usmonov’s home could not be used as evidence during his trial.

Usmonov and four other defendants face substantial fines or jail terms of up to five years, or both, if convicted.

http://www.rferl.org/content/tajik_officials_admit_irregularities_during_bbc_arrest/24309444.html

Ever since social networks have come under greater scrutiny for their role in the Arab Spring — and indeed in the U.K. riots — repressive governments have been scrambling to find ways to rein in the unruly kids and their social networks.

Shutdowns aren’t always good things (except in times of crisis) as they generate bad headlines, so instead there has been a push from some governments to create their own sanitized networks. A new social network called Muloqot is being launched in Uzbekistan in conjunction with the state telecom monopoly. Muloqot can be translated as “dialogue” or “conversation”.

This from the Central Asia Newswire:

The Muloqot (“Dialogue”) web site will be available starting September 1, to coincide with the country’s 20th anniversary of independence.

The social network “will create conditions…for the formation of high morals, for creation of spurs to successful development of modern knowledge and achievements of technical progress, with objective of realization of the idea of the comprehensively developed person,” BBC News on Friday reported Uzbek authorities as saying.

In recent years, many young Uzbeks have gravitated toward global social networks, such as Facebook or Odnoklassniki. A reported 350,000-400,000 people a day use Odnoklassniki, whereas 85,000 people in Uzbekistan have signed up for Facebook, which has become a place where Uzbek opposition and human rights groups are active.

So how will Muloqot work? To register you need an Uzbek mobile phone number (so fewer interfering foreigners). The service, which is in the Uzbek and Russian languages, then sends you a text message, which you have three days to respond to, otherwise your account will be deleted.

The usability is clean, easy to navigate, and with all the usual social-networking functionality: messaging, chat, pictures, music uploads etc. With over half of Uzbekistan’s 7.7 million Internet users accessing through cell phones, the site is well-optimized for mobile.

Colleagues in RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service managed to register on the first day and post RFE/RL content (blocked in Uzbekistan) to a general Wall (at that point there were only about 400 users). Within 15 minutes, however, their profiles were deleted. Another RFE/RL staffer posted some comments praising the president’s daughter, Gulnara Karimova, and their profile has remained active.

But is it likely to catch on? A week after what seems to be a soft launch it has 1,700 users. Even in democracies, it’s not always easy to get young people to sign on to government-led projects, especially when they know they will be under the watchful eyes of the authorities.

But as the director of RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service, Alisher Sidikov, points out, one advantage Muloqot will have is that it benefits from the state telecom monopoly. Sidikov says the authorities can attract users with free, fast services, including generous email storage and music and movies download. Above all, with the site’s sleek design and easy-to-use navigation, it looks like the government above all has understood that it needs to be competitive.

It is another manifestation of a broad trend I have followed on Tangled Web: the attempt to enclose the global commons of the Internet, often under the guise of protecting the moral health of the nation’s youth. (Some background in this post, “Cyber-Westphalia And Its Disruptors”)

There are plenty of precedents for what the Uzbek government is trying to do here. China is the gold standard in offering state-sponsored local-language social-networking services. Last year, the Vietnamese authorities followed suit and tried a similar thing with go.vn, a government-sponsored alternative to Facebook, the only catch being that users have to log in with their full names and government-issued identity numbers.

Iran is more explicitly linking the greater controls with a moral crusade by attempting to set up a “Halal Internet,” supposedly a sanitized worldwide network with content adhering to Islamic principles. The purity of Islam is probably the least of their worries here, but rather their perception of the dangers of what they see as the American-led, Twitter-powered Arab Spring.

What most worries activists in Uzbekistan, though, is that the launch of Muloqot is merely a prelude to a ban of Facebook, which represents the global connected society the Karimov regime is so afraid of. If there was such a ban, the Uzbek authorities would hope that instead of dealing with thousands of angry social-media-starved young people, they would all just pipe down and head on over to Muloqot.

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

Источник: http://www.rferl.org/content/uzbekistan_launches_its_own_facebook_except_its_not_for_everyone/243089

AQTOBE, Kazakhstan — A rights activist and RFE/RL correspondent in Kazakhstan is being sued for libel after she alleged children at a special needs school were being abused, RFE/RL’s Kazakh Service reports.

Alima Abdirova is due to appear in court in the western city of Aqtobe on August 27 after the former director of the school took legal action.

Abdirova is being sued as a member of the independent Kazakh Bureau for Human Rights group, and not as a journalist.

The case centers on comments Abdirova made in an article published in a local newspaper in May, where she said children at the Aqtobe boarding school were subject to beatings and neglect.

Irina Dombrovskaya, the school’s former director, says Abdirova’s comments unfairly portrayed the situation. She is demanding 5 million tenge (some $34,000) for moral damages and 60,000 tenge (some $400) for court costs. Abdirova could also face up to three years in prison if convicted.

Abdirova said the court has ignored the testimony of some witnesses, including that of a former student who alleged violence and other abuses at the school

Abdirova recently has been reporting on security problems in western Kazakhstan where there was a suicide bombing and a clash between security forces and alleged Islamic militants earlier this year.

A regional television station reported on the alleged Islamic militants and showed a photograph of Abdirova with the caption «accomplice» on the screen.

Abdirova said she believes the libel case against her is retaliation by the state security committee (KNB) for her coverage.

http://www.rferl.org/content/rferl_kazakh_reporter_sued_for_libel/24308854.html