Mutabar Tadjibayeva, a leading human rights defender from Uzbekistan, arrived in Berlin, where she will be available for interviews for the next two weeks, HRW reports. She was awarded the prestigious Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders in 2008, and will travel from Berlin to Switzerland for the ceremony.

Tadjibayeva, 46 years old, has been a fearless critic of the Uzbek government and openly spoke out against the massacre of civilians, most of them unarmed, by government forces in Andijan in May 2005. She is also the head of the “Fiery Hearts Club”, an unregistered nongovernmental organization (NGO) in the eastern Uzbek city of Margilan, and has long helped ordinary Uzbeks to seek justice.

On October 7, 2005, in clear retribution for her criticism of the government following the Andijan massacre, Tadjibayeva was arrested in her home on fabricated charges, including an accusation that she was a member of an illegal organization. On March 6, 2006, she was sentenced to eight years in prison in a trial that Human Rights Watch has said blatantly violated fair trial standards.

During her imprisonment, she was subjected to severe ill-treatment. Her health dramatically deteriorated, apparently from the conditions she endured in an isolation cell during winter. She was taken to the Tashkent Oncological Hospital and underwent surgery there on March 18, 2008, but she said that doctors never completely explained her diagnosis or prognosis. Authorities also denied her access to her medical records from her time in prison.

Following sustained international pressure, Tadjibayeva was paroled on June 2, 2008, after serving two years and eight months of her eight-year prison sentence. She believes that she was paroled on medical grounds. Authorities did not acquit her, however, and she continues to serve a three-year suspended sentence and remains at risk of being returned to prison at any time.

Authorities in Uzbekistan initially resisted requests for permission for her to travel, but finally relented under international pressure.

Tadjibayeva was selected to receive the prestigious prize in May 2008 when she was still in prison.

The chairman of the jury of the Martin Ennals Award, Hans Thoolen, described her as “an exceptionally brave woman in a country where standing up for human rights is a dangerous activity that can lead to imprisonment and death; where human rights defenders often have to choose between prison or exile.”

The Martin Ennals Award ceremony will take place in Geneva on November 20, 2008.

For more Human Rights Watch reporting on Uzbekistan, please visit web-site.