Family members of Greek citizen Yanis Galanos, who has been in custody for forty days and was allegedly subjected to torture by the Uzbek security services, addressed Mutabar Tadjibayeva, the head of Fiery Hearts Club international human rights organization, asking to defend him.

During conversation with Uzbek human rights activist living in Paris, family members of 31-year-old Yanis Galanos said that they do not have information yet about his whereabouts. According to them, the lawyer they hired to defend him has been unable to meet with him. When detained, Yanis did not have items of warm clothing. His family members do not know what state he is in today.

According to media reports covering developments in Uzbekistan, Greek citizen Yanis Galanos was detained by armed men on November 13, 2013 in the center of Tashkent and taken away to an unknown destination.

Later on, Uzbek President’s eldest daughter Gulnara Karimova wrote on Twitter that Yanis Galanos was kept in the basement of the National Security Service. According to Gulnara Karimova, they “brutally beat him to wrest an admission of guilt”, and later he was forced to testify in front of the camera.

After these statements, representatives of Ezgulik Human Rights Society met with Yanis Galanos at the Rehabilitation Center of the Internal Affairs Department in Tashkent. In the press release and the video interview released by the human rights society organization on December 4, 2013, Yanis Galanos denied all allegations about tortures applied on him.

After the Yanis Galanos video was released, Gulnara Karimova stated in her interview to Turkish Hürriyet newspaper that that it was a setting of human rights activist Mutabar Tadjibayeva. Apparently, she had mistaken Vasilya Inoyatova, the head of Ezgulik Human Rights Society, with Mutabar Tadjibayeva.

In her return, Mutabar Tadjibayeva stated that all allegations made by the Uzbek President’s eldest daughter are obvious slander, and demanded a public apology from Gulnara Karimova. Otherwise, the human rights activist threatened to sue G. Karimova to defend her honor and reputation. However, according to the human rights activist, this situation cannot serve as a pretext to refuse to defend Yanis Galanos, who previously had collaborated with G. Karimova, and whose rights are grossly violated by the security forces today.

“Having talked with Yanis Galanos’s family members, it was found out that today this guy from Greece really needs legal assistance. But the fact that we decided to deliver assistance to Mr. Galanos, whose rights are grossly violated today, does not mean that I have abandoned my claims against Gulnara Karimova. I will not abandon my decision to defend my honor and dignity in the court until the elder daughter of the Uzbekistan President brings me a public apology for her slander published in Hürriyet newspaper.

“Currently, Fiery Hearts Club Human Rights Organization, which struggles against violations of human rights in Uzbekistan, has a principled stand to protect Yanis Galanos’s rights, who has appeared in the situation similar to those of thousands of inmates in prisons and detention centers of the country. We will not refuse this man in legal protection just because he used to work with Gulnara Karimova for some time.

“Even if we assume that Yanis Galanos was not beaten or tortured (unfortunately, I do not believe this), but the facts that he is kept under arrest in fierce winter without warm clothes and essentials, his relatives are not informed about his whereabouts, his lawyer is not allowed to meet him, and he is completely isolated from the outside world are evidences that physical and psychological tortures are inflicted on him,” says Mutabar Tadjibayeva.

According to the head of Fiery Hearts Club, a position of Greek diplomats is of great significance in regard of Yanis Galanos’s legal protection.

“I believe that today, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Greece should seriously take the case of Yanis Galanos, stand in his defense and demand that the Government of Uzbekistan should provide a meeting with him. If Greek diplomats are allowed to meet with Yanis, they will be able to meet and talk with him not in the room chosen by the prison administration, but in a room that they will choose by themselves to have a meeting with Galanos. As a person, who knows the monstrous scale of tortures and pressures in prisons and detention centers in Uzbekistan, I would advise the Greek diplomats suggest that during a visit Yanis answers their questions using signs, for instance, opening and closing his eyes.

“Furthermore, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Greece should hire a lawyer and this lawyer should familiarize with the protocol of detention and subsequent procedural documents, and immediately apply to a prosecutor’s office and other appropriate bodies with an application in regard of detected violations. I believe that, in its return, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Greece should send an official protest to the Government of Uzbekistan about violations of Yanis Galanos’s rights, a citizen of Greece,” said Mutabar Tadjibayeva.

Asad BAYMURADOV

Editor’s note: When this story was processed, relatives of Yanis Galanos sent an email to Ms. Tadjibayeva with an appeal to Greek diplomats and a scanned version of his Greek passport (ID). International Human Rights Organization Fiery Hearts Club intends to send these documents to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Greece.