Human Rights Developments

Defending Human Rights

The Role of the International Community

Defending Human Rights

As in previous years there was little human rights monitoring by local groups, but a victory of sorts was shared by local women's NGOs when an unfair death sentence imposed on twenty-one-year-old Dilfuza Numonova was commuted in July. The move to commute her sentence had been spearheaded by international organizations, but many local women's organizations signed petitions to the government in her support. The OSCE mission gained access to several of the country's prisons and shared its findings with international medical humanitarian organizations, one of which subsequently implemented an assistance program. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) continued to be denied access to prisoners in accordance with its standard procedures.