Amangeldy Batyrbekov imprisoned

On September 23, the Saryagash district court sentenced Amangeldy Batyrbekov, civil activist, editor of the newspaper Saryagash Info,  to two years and 10 months in prison, finding him guilty of defamation and insult.

Bakhtiyar Abdiev, the head of the education department of the Kelesky district, filed a complaint with the court caused by Batyrbekov's post  on Facebook entitled “Kelestegi keңkelestik” (“Idiocy in Keles”).

In October 2015, Batyrbekov was already sentenced to one and a half years in prison for defamation of Nurlan Saparov, the deputy prosecutor of the Saryagash district. According to the court’s verdict, the libel was contained in the article by A. Batyrbekov “Will the Prosecutor General hear the plea of the innocent if neither the law nor God hear it?"  published on March 10, 2015 in the newspaper "Adilet".

In January 2016, Amangeldy Batyrbekov was released on non-rehabilitating grounds, and a year later sentenced to two years in prison for the same article, but that time under part 3 of Art. 411of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan  - “Slander in relation of judge, jury member, prosecutor, person, executing prejudicial investigation, expert, bailiff, officer of justice”.A. Batyrbekov pleads not guilty and insisted in the courts that his arguments are based on personal inner conviction.

COMMENT

The UN Council and Human Rights Committee have repeatedly recommended Kazakhstan to decriminalize slander and insult. General Comment No. 34 of the UN Human Rights Committee expressly prescribes: “States parties should consider excluding defamation from the category of crimes, but in any case, criminal law should be applied only in connection with the most serious cases, and deprivation of freedom under no circumstances should be considered an adequate measure of punishment. " But  Kazakhstan turns a deaf ear to the words to hear and continues imprisonments. By the way, very soon the country will again report to the UN Human Rights Council on how it respects human rights and implements the recommendations of the international body where it has the status of  a member.