Uzbekistan's Hidden Trials

Human rights defenders in Uzbekistan have discovered that trials of alleged Islamic radicals are taking place across the country in secrecy, with no one allowed access to the courtroom. They fear the tactic is designed to prevent information about abuse in detention leaking out,

The Initiative Group of Independent Human Rights Defenders reports that one secret trial that ended on February 26 involved a group of 15 people accused of anti-constitutional activity, membership of Islamic extremist groups and “inciting ethnic and religious animosity”. At the time this article was published, sentence had yet to be passed, but the law prescribes prison terms of 15 to 20 years for such offences.

The trial took place not far from the capital Tashkent, at the Chirchik district criminal court, where another case was being heard in a different courtroom, this time for the murder last year of Police Colonel Hasan Asadov, head of the interior ministry’s counter-terrorism department, and Abror Abrorov, deputy head of the Kukeldash madrassa or Islamic school; as well as for a failed assassination attempt on the capital’s chief imam or mosque leader, Anvar-Qori Tursunov.

Around 70 people are believed to be standing trial in this case.

“All the accused have been forced to take [defence] lawyers provided by the state, and these have been required by investigators to sign statements that they would not reveal information about proceedings in the courtroom,” said Surat Ikramov, head of the Initiative Group, referring to both the trials in Chirchik. “The accusations were handed to the lawyers before the trial started, and taken away from them when it ended, so as to prevent information leaking out.”

Elsewhere in the country, a similar shroud of secrecy surrounds three trials – two involving 67 and seven people, respectively, in the southern Syr Darya region, and another with 24 people in court in the central Jizak province, according to the Ezgulik human rights right group. In the case involving seven defendants, the accusations are known to relate to their alleged membership of Islamic groups named as Jihodchilar and Birodarlar (“Jihadists” and “Brothers”).

Nothing is being said officially about these trials, and IWPR’s request for more information was turned down by a Tashkent judicial representative.

Human rights defenders in Uzbekistan believe the veil of silence is intended to cover up the lack of real substance behind the allegations.

“There have clearly been flaws in the investigations,” said Diloram Iskhakova, a member of the Expert Working Group, an independent association working on rule-of-law issues.

Iskhakova fears that defendants may have “made confessions under torture, and in court they will talk about this and say they didn’t do what they are accused of doing”.

A police officer who declined to be named insisted that radical Islamic groups were a real danger to Uzbekistan, and were recruiting among the Muslim community. It was impossible that the defendants in the ongoing cases had ended up in court for no reason, he said.

“It would be stupid to deny there are adherents of Jihodchilar, Birodarlar, Hizb ut-Tahrir, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, the Nur movement and Salafis, who disseminate extremist religious ideas here,” he said. “They’re skilled at disguising their views, but they represent a threat to the country, and it’s our duty to safeguard the public and make them admit to their activities.”

Ikramov says there may well be people who are guilty as charged, but pre-trial investigations into these cases must be conducted within the bounds of the law and the court proceedings themselves must take place openly, with independent lawyers and human rights defenders granted full access.

The secrecy surrounding the current trials suggests that defendants may have been mistreated beforehand, he said, adding, “We are aware that investigations entail the use of torture, so they authorities find it inconvenient to hold open trials.”

Uzbekistan has ratified the United Nations Convention Against Torture and Other Forms of Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and has amended its own national legislation to ban the practice, but human rights defenders say physical mistreatment is routinely used as a way of extracting confessions.

An alternative report which three rights groups are submitting to the United Nations Committee on Civil and Political Rights maintains that “torture and abuse by police and investigating authorities remain systemic, unpunished and are tacitly encouraged by government officials”.

Vasila Inoyatova of the Ezgulik group says her organisation has received around 50 letters from relatives of people picked up for the murder case now being heard in Chirchik.

“After the attack on Anvor-Qori, many [Muslim] believers were accused of the crime,” she said. “In reality they had nothing to do with it, but under torture, they may be forced to confess to a crime they did not commit.”

More trials may be in the offing. Since mid-January, the whereabouts of several individuals in the southern Kashkadarya region have been unknown, and relatives fear they may be being held in custody in secrecy, so they can be coerced into confessing to crimes relating to Muslim extremist activity. These disappearances follow the detention of some 30 Muslim women in November (See Wave of Arrests Ahead of Eid in Uzbekistan, News Briefing Central Asia, 17-Nov-09.)

Kamilla Abdullaeva is the pseudonym of a journalist in Uzbekistan.

This article was produced under IWPR’s Building Central Asian Human Rights Protection & Education Through the Media programme, funded by the European Commission. The contents of this article are the sole responsibility of IWPR and can in no way be taken to reflect the views of the European Union.