Kazakhstani human rights defenders and activists petitioned the Almaty police department with a demand to stop prosecuting bloggers who publish hard-hitting facts about the corruption of state and quasi-state structures.
For example, the text of an online petition published to collect signatures on the website of the Coalition for the Security and Protection of Human Rights Defenders PANA cites as an example the story of blogger Anton Budarov, who was prosecuted under Article 274 of the Criminal Code — Dissemination of knowingly false information that creates a dangerous violation of public order or causing substantial harm to the rights and legitimate interests of citizens or organizations, or the interests of society or the state protected by law.
According to the authors of the petition, Budarov has been criticizing the work of the police for a long time. On August 23, the blogger posted on his youtube-channel Civil Patrol a video called House of a corrupted policeman, about the head of the processing center of the Almaty police department, detained red-handed on August 8 this year while receiving a bribe in the amount of two thousand US dollars.
As reported at the time in the Anti-Corruption Department, the head of the processing center created an original scheme for taking money from citizens. Together with the pseudo-judicial executor, he received money from traffic offenders, but instead of directing these funds to the budget, he appropriated it to himself. As a result of such actions, according to anti-corruption fighters, the state budget did not receive more than $ 640,000.
Anton Budarov and his team, using footage of operational filming from the arrest of a thieving police officer, found his house, where the arrest took place. Bloggers have posted views of three two-story mansions located on the same site in the video. Also, two cars of the head of the processing center – Mercedes-Benz W221 were shown, the approximate cost of which is about $ 80 thousand. The blogger’s film crew tried to talk on the intercom with the wife of the detained chief, but their attempt was unsuccessful. All this was shown in the video. It was because of it that the blogger was charged with spreading deliberately false information.
Besides, Budarov published another video stating that the tender for the repair of pedestrian zones in Almaty was won by a deputy of the local elected body, who is also the director of the Etalon plant (production of metal products).
There are other bloggers mentioned in the petition who also suffered for publications about corrupt officials. In particular, we are talking about activists Danae Kalieva and Marat Turymbetov. They are accused of spreading deliberately false information in a state of emergency. Recall that the state of emergency was introduced in Kazakhstan from March 16 to May 11 – due to the coronavirus pandemic. Kaliyeva and Turymbetov published posts on social networks during this period, in which they studied the procurement plan of the joint-stock company Zhilstroisberbank (a financial institution with state participation, which implements a system of housing construction savings in the country. The bank participates in state and industry programs – ACCA).
According to activists, the bank’s procurement plan for 2020 envisaged expenditures totaling more than $ 3.5 million. Since the bank is state-owned, activists asked how expedient these purchases were, especially in the context of a pandemic and economic crisis. The management of Zhilstroysberbank saw in these publications knowingly false information and appealed to the police with a statement to bring Kalieva and Turymbetov to justice.
“The prosecution of bloggers and civic activists under Article 274 can put an end to civil initiatives to identify corruption components in the actions of civil servants and employees of commercial structures,” the authors of the petition write. – The initiation of criminal cases under Article 274 without sufficient grounds, without attempts to reach a consensus within the framework of civil law, suggests that the use of this article is intended to prevent criticism of officials and big business, often affiliated with the state. This creates danger both for the media in Kazakhstan and for active citizens who exercise their constitutional right to freedom of expression and participation in the government of the country.
It should be reminded that in Kazakhstan this is not the first case of bringing to justice of civil activists who criticize the authorities too sharply. Thus, on June 22, a verdict was passed on civil activist Alnur Ilyashev, who, according to the case file, published posts on social networks containing negative information regarding the Nur Otan Party public association, chaired by the first president of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev. Ilyashev was sentenced to three years of restriction of freedom.
We also note that according to the head of the Kazakhstan Bureau for Human Rights and Compliance with the Law Yevgeny Zhovtis, the article “Dissemination of knowingly false information” should be excluded from the Criminal Code.
“Many civil activists are being held accountable under this article. There are still articles in the Criminal Code concerning the encroachment on the honor and dignity of the first president and the president in general, on the honor and dignity of the deputies, there is an insult to a representative of the authorities. That is, the Criminal Code contains several articles that continue to criminalize the word. Just a word that might be inaccurate, that might be offensive, and so on. In my opinion, these articles should not exist in the criminal code at all. For this, a person cannot be punished criminally! He can be punished with a fine, a refutation can be demanded, but he cannot be held criminally liable, ”Zhovtis said in an interview with ACCA.
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