May 2014 ойлик архив
Narzullo Okhunzhonov: Alone with conscience
There are two ways to fight defects in the society: the first one is to struggle against corrupt officials and the second one is to struggle against the dictatorship, which has been the reason for corruption to root.
I must admit that I was not courageous to openly protest against the existing regime in the country. I fought against corruption. Because I believed that the government is not to blame for these crimes. I blamed only medium and low level officials, who abuse confidence of the government and the nation. But after I became a “criminal” in the course of my struggle against corrupt officials, I deeply realized the whole harmfulness of this regime.
Prominent human rights activist Elena Ryabinina passed away (updated+audio)
Elena Ryabinina, aged 60, the manager of Right to Asylum Program of the Human Rights Institute and a prominent human rights activist, passed away on Sunday morning in Moscow.
Recently Elena Ryabinina had cancer, but nevertheless, she worked hard and a lot. She did not cry, she did not complain, and she did not ask for anything…
Elena Ryabinina was a strong woman.
She often made comments about Central Asian refugees for Jarayon’s website. Elena gave her last interview for our website on March 30 2014, and the next day she was hospitalized.
Mutabar Tadjibayeva and Muhammad Bekzhan entered the “100 Information Heroes” list
For the first time ever International organization “Reporters without Borders” that promotes and defends freedom of information and freedom of the press has published a list of the hundred most active journalists, bloggers and human rights activists, who has made the largest contribution to public awareness.
The Paris-based international organization “Reporters without Borders” published a list of profiles of “100 Information Heroes” on the eve of World Press Freedom Day celebrated worldwide on May 3.
This list comprises the names of representatives from 65 countries of the world aged between 25 and 75, including two representatives from Uzbekistan: Mutabar Tadjibayeva, the head of Fiery Hearts Club International Human Rights Organization,and Muhammad Bekzhan, theimprisoned editor of “Erk” opposition newspaper.
Mutabar Tadjibayeva. Six years ago, Mutabar Tadjibayeva was fighting for her life in an Uzbek prison. While jailed from October 2005 to June 2008, this independent journalist and human rights right defender spent more than 100 days in solitary and was subjected to monstrous forms of mistreatment for refusing to sign a confession. Her crime? Documenting human rights violations by the Uzbek authorities for several years, defending their victims and, above all, investigating the 2005 Andijane vents, in which hundreds of innocent people died.
Freed in 2008 after being given the Martin Ennals Award, she now lives in France. Despite a new smear campaign, she has not lost any of her combativeness, running an NGO called the “Fiery Hearts Club”, which has launched the news site Jarayon. Using a vast network of citizen-journalists and local activists, this trilingual site is one of the few sources of independent information about Uzbekistan and its neighbors.
