Last week, information was distributed on the KelKel Yahoo mailing list about the forthcoming continuation of the trial of several of human rights activists including Valentina Gritsenko from the Oblast Human Rights Organisation Spravedlivost (”Justice”).

In light of the fact that the Kyrgyz government under Akaev was quick to use libel laws to silence opposition, and that the current government has shown similar tendencies, and this is not the only case of a policeman seeking damages from human rights activists, as Maksim Kuleshov discovered in January this year, this information seemed to merit a little more investigation, especially given the lack of information in English.

The original case was caused by an article published in Spravedlivost’s monthy bulletin, entitled Pravo dlya vsekh or Rights for All. The article, which was entitled, “They beat women, even pregnant ones”, concerned the actions of Jalalabad investigator lieutenant-colonel Ali Mageev:

“When I wanted to sit down on a chair, Mageev grabbed me by the arm and knocked me away. He said that I was a whore and a thief. When I asked why I was being insulted and beaten, he struck me on the chest and demanded that I withdraw the statement I had previously made. He threatened that if I didn’t, he would take measures so that I would rot in prison”, writes housewife Nargiza Turdieva from Suzak region to the human rights protection organisation Spravedlivost [“Justice”].

The article went on to note that Mageev had also been accused of extortion and complaints had been made to the Jalalabad Procurator’s Office with no result. Similarly, as ferghana.ru reports, the editors of the bulletin had been unable to contact Ali Mageev about the allegations:

Both Mageev himself and his superiors were unavailable when the material was being prepared. The author of the article ‘phoned the UVD several times and personally went to speak to Mageev, but the policeman on duty would not admit him to the building, saying that “a journalist can come when he has been summoned by lieutentant-colonel Mageev”.

Consequently the publication of the article went ahead. (An English translation of the whole article can be downloaded here).

However, Lieutentant-colonel Ali Mageev then decided to sue five of the people connected to the article for libel. In his claim to Jalalabad Municipal Court, he requested the following:

On the basis of the above and in accordance with section 5, article 18 of the Civil Code and section 1, article 41 of the Civil Procedural Code of the Kyrgyz Republic,

I REQUEST THAT

1. My statement of claim is accepted and the following people are recognised as defendants and co-defendants:

[…]

2. To seek from the defendants and co-defendants monetary compensation for expenditures I have incurred (property and material harm) of 156,851 (one hundred and fifty six thousand eight hundred and fifty one) som and 72 tyins, and for moral injury the sum of 1,000,000 (one million) som.

3. To compel the defendants and co-defendants to publish a refutation of the reports that have defamed me using the same means as those by which they were originally distributed, that is, in the same media, in the same font, in the same columns of the page of the bulletin, and that the refutation is without any photographs and drawings.

In total he demanded compensation of 1,156,851 som and 72 tyin - or $30,503.67 at today’s exchange rates, of which one million som was compensation for “moral injury”. Quite a considerable claim to make on the basis on one article. (An English translation of the entire text of the claim can be downloaded here.)

However, in his claim Mageev argues that the effects of the article on him and his family were extremely severe:

On that same day as when our family found out about everything, my daughter Gulsinam took ill, whilst in the evening my son Ismail started to feel very unwell. Later my wife Emina, who had also endured stressful conditions, took ill as well and I had to take them both to medics and to mullahs in order to somehow lessen their suffering, we were beside ourselves, we did not have the spiritual balance that we had had until this. Fearfulness, headaches, dizziness, fatigue, problems with digestion, rapid heart beat, pains, shortness of breath, sleeplessness, sluggishness, and diminished appetite all afflicted us, and still afflict us all, both me and my wife and our son and daughter. We were treated, we have spent a huge amount of resources, but it has not helped.

Moreover, Mageev asked the court to consider the damage to the family’s reputation, noting that: “The most hurtful thing is that due to the “dirt” in the article, since that day my close family, as well as myself, go around with our heads downcast, we cannot look people, our neighbours, and colleagues at work in the eye at the mosque or in other public places”.

Mageev goes on to assert that due to the original article appearing on the sites of a number of Internet publications, the damage to his reputation is all the more serious and may have implications for his ability to travel to America, European and East Asian countries, since:

Moreover, this article had been published in 14 Internet newspapers of the world on April 23, therefore it follows that by the end of 2006 the “monster and extortionist” Mageev will be known on all sites of the world wide Internet [sic]. Such is the social danger of libellous poison pens.

Now it is not difficult to imagine that for Ali Mageev the countries of America, Europe and East Asia will become very difficult to access, and sometimes even closed as they are for certain high-placed persons from the Republic of Uzbekistan, and there [i.e. the West – CXW] they follow the ratings of civil servants of all the countries of the world very closely.

This damage to his reputation - and, by extension, to that of all employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Kyrgyz Republic - is proven in the claim using 3 excerpts from the comments section of the online version of Obshchestvennji reiting. Certainly the comments are anti-police, but it seems a little shaky to base such a huge claim on and make the following assertion:

The skilful literary constructions of the editorial team of the bulletin Pravo dlaya vsekh […] make me into a monster and harsh tormentor, an oppressor or even simply a torturer, and in the end into a soulless beast that feels no pity towards people.

What is most interesting to me in his claim is the way he saw an internal investigation at work as merely adding to his stress levels, rather than seeing it as a chance to clear himself and refute the claims. The outcome of the investigation is not mentioned.

Similarly, Mageev seems to think that being the subject of such an article is a privilege reserved for politicians:

I am not a public politician and I have never wished to be subject to impartial [sic - CXW] criticism.

Granted, he is not a politician, but he is certainly a public servant as a government employee and is (or should be) publicly accountable. Apparently not in his opinion.

The original trial began on June 20, 2006 and Voice of Freedom reported from the courtroom (in Russian), noting that requests to video proceedings were refused and generally things did not run smoothly. On the second day proceedings were suspended for an indefinite period of time after Nargiza Turdieva, the pregnant woman who originally wrote to Spravedlivost, was taken ill. Her deterioration was apparently linked to receiving threats from Mageev’s supporters, reported Ferghana.ru

Which brings us up to the present. After a ten-month break, Jalalabad Municipal Court began hearing the case again yesterday, May 22. The charges remain the same and as yet there are no reports on the proceedings.

There are two main issues that concern me in this case. Specifically with regards to this case, it is, as people involved with the case have noted, worrying that Mageev has remained on active duty given the mental state he describes himself as being in as a result of the publication of the original article:

It seems to me that it is as if everyone is talking about me, and I have a sensation as though my heart is seizing – this fearfulness does not leave me often, I have even started to be afraid of even [sic - CXW] animals, as if some dog will bite me or cow go to butt me – all of this has gradually begun to exhaust me. I have become bad-tempered, aggressive, I fall asleep with difficulty, worry at night, suffer from pains in my neck, shoulders and back, and always feel that everyone hates me. I have lost the assiduousness that is a characteristic quality of an investigator.

This not the sort of person that should have access to a firearm or be responsible for public safety if his condition is as severe as he portrays it - and if it isn’t, then he is possibly guilty of perjury as well as harassment.

The matter of harassment is the more general issue, and specifically the use of draconian libel laws to silence dissenting or critical voices. As was noted in relation to the Kuleshov case earlier this year, the purpose of such claims by policemen and politicians - all public servants - seems to be discouraging people from reporting abuses of power or from criticising their actions (as if the existing reputation of the courts was not enough). Furthermore, last year saw several newspapers warned to cease publishing “libellous” claims and the instigation of checks on NGOs in receipt of foreign funding, as the IPI World Press Freedom Review noted.

In light of this the human rights activist community, as well as the NGO sector more widely, have every reason to be worried, and their concerns are backed up international organisations such as Freedom House, which recently issued a press-release “Freedom of Expression Under Siege in Kyrgyzstan” .

I’m not usually a fan of foreign governments telling other states what to do, but on matters such as this I can only echo Freedom House’s call for more vocal discussion in the international community of concerns about press freedom. Meanwhile, incidents such as this one need to be as widely publicised as possible with the aim of ensuring that public servants cannot continue to harass the very people they are charged with protecting using oppressive and inherently unjust legislation.

UPDATE 24 May: The case has been postponed at the request of the defendants due to prior commitments on the part of their lawyer and the defendants themselves.

Thanks to those people who assisted with background information.
All translations are the author’s own