New attack on Amangeldy Batyrbekov

On December 11, at 3PM, a court hearings should begin in the Saryagash district court on the new defamation and insult charges against journalist Amangeldy Batyrbekov. This time the plaintiff  is Leyla Darkhanbaeva. She introduces herself a professional mediator, chairman of NGO "Zangar-Medet" and accuses A. Batyrbekov, as well as his wife Gulzada Baimuratova, Pazilkhan Tuymebaev, Gulshan Artykbaeva, Mustafin Baydullaev and Kudret Yerzhebbaev of defamation and insult. As she believes the defendants committed the said crimes by Facebook posts.As it was reported,  on September 23, 2019, the Saryagash district court of the Turkestan region found sentenced civil activist, editor of the newspaper Saryagash info Amangeldy Batyrbekov guilty in defamation and insult and sentenced him to two years and 3 months in prison. The victim is Bakhtiyar Abdiev, the head of the education department of the Keles region, of whom Batyrbekov  published a number of critical posts on his Facebook page.

The sentence was appealed, and the appeal board of the Turkestan Regional Court started the legal proceedings. The board of appeals of the Turkestan Regional Court at its session held on  November 25 considered the expert finding made by the decision of the Saryagash District Court that found signs of insult in the journalist’s article. The author of that expert finding could not answer a number of significant questions in the second instance court. Moreover, it turned out that she was a specialist in Russian, not Kazakh philology. As a result, the court сommissioned a new forensic expert opinion of the controversial text.The next hearing is expected when the new expert study is ready.

By the way, at all court hearings in Turkestan L. Darhanbaeva was sitting next to B. Abdiev, who filed the lawsuit that led to the journalist's 27 months in prison sentence.