15 years' jail for UNHCR-recognised refugee if deportation to Uzbekistan proceeds

Uzbekistan is now seeking to extradite detained UNHCR-recognised refugee Makset Djabbarbergenov from Kazakhstan on charges which carry a maximum 15 year jail term. The Protestant who fled to Kazakhstan is being sought by Uzbekistan for exercising freedom of religion or belief in his home town of Nukus. A Kazakh 15 October Almaty court decision, authorised further detention until 5 November. The Kazakh court also claimed that the Uzbek charges – which seek to prosecute exercising freedom of religion or belief – can be equated to terrorism-related charges in Kazakh law. Djabbarbergenov's wife has been stopped by Kazakh authorities from visiting him, she told Forum 18 News Service, as has a human rights defender who found he is being held in solitary confinement. The Supreme Court claims it cannot find an appeal he lodged in August. Also, Kazakhstan has yet to reply to a finding of the UN Committee Against Torture that it violated human rights obligations by extraditing to Uzbekistan a group of Muslim refugees and asylum seekers. Kazakhstan's current bid to join the UN Human Rights Council claims it would, if elected, "enhance the credibility and effectiveness of the Human Rights Council".

Court documents seen by Forum 18 News Service reveal that Uzbekistan is now seeking to extradite Protestant pastor Makset Djabbarbergenov from Kazakhstan on charges which carry a maximum 15 year prison term. A 15 October Almaty court decision, authorising further detention until 5 November, reveals that the Uzbek authorities have changed one of the two accusations to a charge carrying a punishment of between five and 15 years' imprisonment. An official from Kazakhstan's Almaty Prosecutor's Office told Forum 18 that they are still awaiting materials in the case from Uzbekistan's General Prosecutor's Office. An earlier 7 September Almaty court decision, authorising Djabbarbergenov's initial 40-day detention while Uzbekistan's extradition request was considered, spoke of two Uzbek Criminal Code charges, each carrying a maximum three-year term. The Kazakh Prosecutor's Office confirmed this to Forum 18 (see F18News 10 September 2012 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=1739). Meanwhile, the Kazakh government has not yet responded to the United Nations Committee Against Torture. In June the Committee found that Kazakhstan had violated the rights of a group of Uzbek Muslims who were extradited to Uzbekistan in 2011, and asked for a response to this from Kazakhstan (see F18News 10 September 2012 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=1739). "We want him freed" Djabbarbergenov's wife, Aigul Tleumuratova, complained to Forum 18 that it was only after the 15 October hearing (which she did not attend) that she too learnt that the Uzbek authorities are seeking to imprison her husband for up to 15 years. "We want him freed," she told Forum 18 from Kazakhstan's commercial capital Almaty on 28 October. "I and our older children are praying for him. We all miss him." Tleumuratova is expecting their fifth child next year. Djabbarbergenov is still being held in Almaty's Investigation Prison (LA 155/1). Tleumuratova has not seen her husband since his arrest on 5 September. "Last Tuesday [23 October] I wrote to the Prosecutor's Office asking to be allowed a meeting, but have heard nothing," she told Forum 18. "They say we are only allowed a meeting once a month, and you have to apply through the Prosecutor's Office." The address of the prison Djabbarbergenov is being held in is: Almaty Investigation Isolation Prison No. 1 LA 155/1 050004 Almaty Region Almaty Prospekt Seifullina 473 Kazakhstan In 2011, Tleumuratova along with the rest of Djabbarbergenov's family was denied refugee status by the Kazakh government. This was despite the fact that in 2008 the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had formally recognised their status as refugees (see F18News 10 September 2012http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=1739). Because the Kazakh government has denied her refugee status, Tleumuratova has no valid Kazakh government documents and so is unable to hand over parcels for her husband. However, she said friends have been able to pass on food and clothes too him in prison, as well as a Bible and medicines for a cold. Solitary confinement, attempted visits fail Tleumuratova tried to visit her husband on 11 September, but was denied access at the prison. They told her he was, like all new prisoners, being held in "quarantine", which had been extended from three days to ten. That same day, Ivar Dale, Regional Representative Central Asia of the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, also tried to visit him. He too was denied access, but was taken to a woman only identified as "the boss" on the prison's second floor, as he told Forum 18 from Almaty. "The boss" told Dale that the Prosecutor's Office needs to give permission for any visit to Djabbarbergenov. "He is just sitting here, but they are the ones who have his case," she told him. "She had a file on him with some forms and fingerprints and such. I asked why it was necessary to have him in quarantine for as long as 10 days, as he had no personal items with him. She explained that during quarantine, the inmate is looked at by doctors, examined and so forth." Despite "the boss'" insistence to Dale that Djabbarbergenov's wife could pass on personal items for him, Dale told Forum 18 this was the opposite of what the guards had told Tleumuratova that same day. When she returned later in the day with a bag of items for her husband, it was again refused. "The boss" at the prison told Dale on 11 September that Djabbarbergenov would not be extradited for at least two or three months, "minimum", she kept repeating. Source