…of Gaibullo Zhalilov, Ganikhon Mamatkhanov…

IHRDG: In 2010 39 convicts died in the jails of Uzbekistan

In 2010 39 prisoners, convicted of religious charges, died of torture in the jails and colonies of Uzbekistan. The relatives were secretly given their bodies and prohibited to report the incidents to journalists and rights defenders, says the report, prepared by Surat Ikramov, the head of Independent Human Rights Defenders Group.

According to him, the human rights situation has deteriorated in comparison to 2009. The number of people, suffering from socio-economic problems, is increasing. In the regions – oblasts, districts and villages – the local administration, police and security officers, attorney and judges abuse power, the report indicates.

In 2010 484 citizens of Uzbekistan as well as 14 foreign citizens from Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Russian Federation addressed IHRDG with statements on violation of human rights.

IHRDG received 34 regular mails, 78 emails, 204 telephone calls. IHRDG addressed 8 letters to international organizations and 11 letters to other states and embassies. Most frequently IHRDG was contacted by citizens whose relatives were illegally detained by police and security officers. They were convicted and jailed on trumped-up religious charges. As a rule, the defendants had been routinely tortured before they faced closed trials.

IHRDG ran 17 cases judicial monitoring of people, convicted of political and religious charges. The group identified that criminal cases against photographer and film maker Umida Akhmedova, deputy chief editor of Champion newspaper Khairullo Khamidov, part-time Voice of America correspondent Abdumalik Boboev and Russian journalist and correspondent of Parlamentskaya gazeta Vladimir Berezovskiy have been trumped-up while the results of judicial processes were ordered in advance. The same scenario was observed in the cases of Gaibullo Zhalilov, Ganikhon Mamatkhanov and some other.

Within a year over 370 believers were detained, arrested and convicted of the membership in the prohibited religious groups such as Nursi, Hizb ut-Tahrir, Wahabbism and Zhikhochilar. The secret trials were run in Tashkent, Karshi, Ferghana, Kokand, Samarqand and other regions of Uzbekistan.

According to IHRDG, the number of cases of corruption, bribery, blackmail is growing in the republic; as a result, dozens of judges, police and security officers, the number of khokims (heads of local authorities) in the oblasts and districts were fired and brought to trial.

The child labor (students of school, lyceums and colleges) is continued to be used in cotton fields. During cotton-picking season the children were forced to work 12 hours per day. The laws on prohibiting the child labor do not work. According to IHRDG report, the orders to use child labor for the cotton-picking are initiated by the tops officials.

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