The Adil Soz Foundation responds to the blocking of the Legal Media Center director’s account

Gulmira Birzhanova, Head of the Media Qoldau Legal Service at the Legal Media Center Public Foundation, reported that Facebook had suspended access to the account of Diana Okremova, Director of the Legal Media Center Public Foundation.

The stated reason for blocking the account and removing the post was an alleged “infringement of third-party copyright” and a violation of the platform’s terms governing intellectual property.

The Legal Media Center had previously filed a lawsuit against the Ministry of Culture and Information seeking access to information on the use of public funds to finance private media outlets.

Diana Okremova asked the court to declare unlawful the Ministry of Culture’s refusal, dated 23 April 2026, to disclose information on the amount of public funding allocated as grants to private media outlets. She also asked the court to require the ministry to provide the requested information in full and to find that classifying the information as restricted-access official information was unjustified.

The defendant rejected the claims as unfounded. The ministry argued that the requested information fell within a category subject to restricted access and asked the court to dismiss the lawsuit.

Commenting on the incident on Instagram, Diana Okremova directly linked the blocking of her account to her professional activities:

“My Facebook account has been blocked over alleged intellectual property violations. More specifically, because of my post about the court case against the Ministry of Culture,” she wrote.

She was referring to a post published on 12 July in which she announced a court hearing in the lawsuit against Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Culture and Information:

“Friends, our court hearing with the Ministry of Culture is tomorrow! The hearing will take place on 13 July at 3:00 p.m. ...” the post read.

Gulmira Birzhanova described the incident as a “shameful response” and a dangerous precedent for suppressing information in the public sphere.

The Adil Soz Foundation believes that the mass complaints against the account were an attempt to limit public awareness of the court proceedings involving the relevant ministry and calls for an end to the blocking of independent media.