The international human rights organization HRW again criticized in its regular report the human rights situation in Tajikistan.
“The human rights situation in Tajikistan continued to deteriorate amid continued crackdown on freedom of expression and political opposition, as well as harassment of independent lawyers, journalists and family members of opposition activists based abroad. The government blocked access to sites that host critical materials and put pressure on human rights organizations,” the report of this authoritative human rights organization says. “Freedom of religion and belief is severely restricted. LGBT people are subject to various forms of discrimination and exclusion from society. Family violence remained a serious problem. Significant gaps in legislation, lack of responsibility for domestic violence and inadequate response from the authorities prevent women from seeking help and support.”
The editors provide below to their readers the excerpts from the World Report 2021 (the 31st annual survey of human rights practices and trends around the world).
Civil society
Experts of Human Rights Watch note that the authorities were very sensitive to activities related to political rights, torture, elections, corruption, religious freedom, or LGBT rights/issues, and began to put pressure on activists. Thus, human rights activists complained about the activity of pro-government ‘troll factories’ aimed at discrediting critical voices online.
Conditions in places of detention and torture
For many years, human rights activists have criticized the penitentiary system in Tajikistan for poor conditions of detention, cramped conditions, torture and cruel treatment of prisoners. Closed institutions are not only unable to fulfill all the tasks assigned to them, but, on the contrary, instead of correction, some convicts are released fierce and aggressive, which threatens public safety.
Even though a new prison in Vakhdat was put into operation in July, prisons in Tajikistan generally remain undeveloped and overcrowded. The amnesty, which was announced in 2021, didn’t affect political prisoners, whose conditions in prison became even tougher.
In September, Hikmatullo Saifullozoda, a journalist and activist from the banned Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan, who was sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2015, was attacked in a prison hospital. Earlier this year, Reporters without Borders called on the authorities to release Saifullozoda under an amnesty over the risks to his safety behind bars.
In June, three police officers were sentenced to long prison terms for using torture to force self-incrimination in a murder case in 2017. They beat and tortured Khasan Edgorov with a stun gun. The man served six months in prison and was released after the real killer was apprehended.
In places of detention, physical and sexual violence against women by police officers is also widespread. In 2019, the Civil Society Coalition against Torture and Impunity in Tajikistan documented the situation of a 24-year-old woman who was detained for two days on suspicion of theft. Police officers from the Department of Internal Affairs of Vakhsh district used physical force against her, verbally abused her, gave her an injection, that left her unable to move her limbs, and raped her. To date, none of the employees have been charged, as the victim’s claim is still pending.
Pressure on critics and dissidents
In 2021, the government continued to harass and jail government critics, oppositionists, dissidents abroad, and their relatives who remained in the country.
In June, the City Court of Khujand sentenced former member of the banned Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan Mirzo Khojimuhammad, also known as Mirzokul Khojimatov, to five years in prison on charges of “participation in a banned extremist organization”. Khojimuhammad left the IRPT in 2015 and has been living in Russia since 2019. After returning to Tajikistan in February, he was banned from leaving the country and arrested in May.
In March, Izzat Amon, a migrant rights advocate, who had criticized the government of Tajikistan on social media, was abducted in Moscow and forcibly returned to Tajikistan. In Moscow, Amon headed the Center “Tojikon”, which provided legal assistance to Tajik migrants. For two days, his whereabouts remained unknown, after which the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Tajikistan reported that he was in custody on a case of fraud. In September, in court, the prosecutor requested nine years in prison for him. Although the fraud cases were eligible for an amnesty, Izzat Amon was sentenced in October to nine years, and in November the Supreme Court upheld the decision of the trial court.
In August, the authorities of Tajikistan opened a criminal case for “public calls for extremist activity” against Hussein Ishankulov, one of Amon’s now former colleagues at the Center “Tojikon”. He is charged with calls on social networks to demand the release of Amon.
Freedom of expression
Under the pretext of protecting national security, the State Communications Service regularly blocks websites containing information that may be critical of the government, including Facebook, the Tajik service of Radio Liberty (Radio Ozodi), and opposition resources. Journalists and bloggers, who make critical posts on social networks, are subject to criminal prosecution under a law amendment of 2017 that allows security agencies to monitor users’ online activity, including monitoring mobile messages and comments.
In June, lawyer Abdulmajid Rizoev was sentenced to five and a half years in prison in the case of “public incitement to extremist activities using the media or the Internet” (Article 307 of the Criminal Code). He was detained in November 2020. At the trial, which began in February 2021, the state prosecutor said that his posts and reposts on Facebook contained signs of “extremism”. These materials expressed doubt about the turnout for the 2020 parliamentary elections and quoted classics of Tajik literature about wise and narrow-minded rulers.
As Radio Ozodi reported, as of October, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in violation of Tajikistan’s media accreditation law, had long remained silent on eight requests for accreditation for its journalists, and several staff members received accreditation for only a few months. Radio Ozodi journalists continue to face intimidation at work and at home from state security officials who threaten them with serious consequences if they continue to work for Radio Liberty’s Tajik service.
Freedom of Religion and Belief
The government severely restricts freedom of religion or belief by banning the wearing of certain clothing, including the hijab for women and long beards for men. Since 2011, Salafism (a fundamentalist movement in Islam) has been officially banned in Tajikistan, and alleged members of Salafi groups are regularly arrested by the authorities.
In June, a closed trial began in the case of 18 alleged Salafists. Almost no information about the defendants and the charges against them made public. All defendants lived in Bobojon Gafurov district in northern Tajikistan and were arrested during a police raid in February. According to the relatives, they deny their involvement either in the Salafists or in any other religious extremist organizations. The defendants claimed to have been tortured by the police after their arrest in order to force them to confess. In July, 14 out of 18 defendants were sentenced to prison terms ranging from 5 to 5.5 years. The rest received a year in prison for not reporting a crime.
In October, Parliament began considering amendments to the Criminal Code that would increase sanctions for illegal religious education, including online, to three years in prison. Previously, administrative liability was provided for this in the form of a fine of up to 72,000 somoni (approximately $6,000), and in case of repeated prosecution, there was imprisonment for up to three years.
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