• Human Rights in Kazakhstan

    Despite government claims to the contrary, Kazakhstan has a disappointing human rights record. It failed to carry out meaningful rights reform during its 2010 chairmanship of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, and keeps tight control over freedom of assembly, religion and media. In mid-December 2011, law enforcement used lethal force against civilians in response to rampages and looting in Zhanaozen, the site of a 7-month oil workers’ strike in western Kazakhstan. In August 2011, a union lawyer was imprisoned for six years for speaking out on workers’ rights and Kazakhstan’s most-prominent human rights defender, Evgeniy Zhovtis, remains in prison.

  • Defendants accused of participating in the December 2011 clashes in Zhanaozen sit in a glass cubicle during a court session in Aktau on March 27, 2012.
    © 2012 Reuters
    Kazakhstan: Ensure Fair Trial for Oil Workers, Others
    The Kazakhstan judiciary should ensure a fair and public trial for the 37 people scheduled for trial on March 27, 2012, on charges of organizing and participating in mass unrest in December 2011.
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Kazakhstan

  • Kazakhstan: Suspend Trial, Investigate Torture Allegations
    Apr 23, 2012
    – Kazakhstan authorities should immediately suspend the trial of 37 oil workers and others pending a prompt and independent investigation into the defendants’ torture allegations.
  • Kazakhstan: Journalist Stabbed in Violent Attack
    Apr 21, 2012
    Kazakhstan authorities should carry out a prompt, thorough, and effective investigation into the vicious attack on Lukpan Akhmedyarov, an independent journalist.
  • Kazakhstan: Allow Peaceful Protests
    Mar 27, 2012
    Kazakhstan police should respect the fundamental freedoms of expression and assembly and not interfere with peaceful rallies planned for March 24, 2012.
  • Kazakhstan: Ensure Fair Trial for Oil Workers, Others
    Mar 26, 2012
    The Kazakhstan judiciary should ensure a fair and public trial for the 37 people scheduled for trial on March 27, 2012, on charges of organizing and participating in mass unrest in December 2011.
  • Kazakhstan: Lawyer Freed, but Rights Restricted
    Mar 14, 2012
    Conditions imposed on a union lawyer freed from prison by Kazakh authorities on March 7, 2012, prevent her from resuming her labor activism and infringe on her fundamental rights.
  • Kazakhstan President Nazarbayev’s Visit to Berlin
    Feb 10, 2012
    Take a map of Central Asia, and German diplomats and business people who know the region are likely to identify Kazakhstan as the most important and stable player in an otherwise troubled part of the world.
  • Kazakhstan/Germany: Make Rights Key to Good Relations
    Feb 6, 2012
    German Chancellor Angela Merkel should raise urgent human rights concerns with the Kazakhstan government during talks with President Nursultan Nazarbaev on February 8, 2012.
  • Kazakhstan: Letter to the Prosecutor General regarding the December events in Zhanaozen and Shetpe
    Feb 1, 2012
    I am writing to express Human Rights Watch’s profound concern about several issues related to the December 16 and 17 events in Zhanaozen and Shetpe. These include allegations about excessive use of lethal force by law enforcement, ill-treatment and torture of detainees taken into custody following the December 16 violence in Zhanaozen, allegations of theft and extortion by police officers, and arrests of oil workers and labor and political activists charged in connection with the violence.
  • Kazakhstan: Opposition Activists Arrested
    Jan 24, 2012
    Kazakh national security agents in Almaty detained a leading opposition activist on January 23, 2012.
  • The Soviet Fall and the Arab Spring
    Jan 10, 2012
    Twenty years ago, in July 1991, I was poised to start a job researching human rights violations in the Soviet Union. A month later, the failed coup to unseat Communist Party leader Mikhail Gorbachev precipitated rapid political changes that would lead to the dissolution of the Soviet Union on December 25. Watching these events, my family told me I would no longer have a job. Like many others, they assumed that the end of communism would usher in a new era of democracy, the rule of law, and human rights in the Soviet Union’s successor states. I started my new job as planned and it only took five minutes to see that those assumptions were wrong.
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