Kazakhstan: raped convict tried to commit suicide

The Coalition of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) against Torture in Kazakhstan has revealed another scandalous fact of torture of prisoners. The shocking story of the abuse of the convicted citizen N., serving a sentence in the women’s colony ЛA 155/4, human rights activists told in their open appeal addressed to the Prosecutor General of Kazakhstan Gizat Nurdauletov and the Prosecutor of Almaty region Azamat Zhylkybaev.

As follows from the appeal, citizen N. was brought to the colony when she was three months pregnant. On June 4, 2020, she gave birth to a son. The child died 6 days later. On the same day, the woman, who had lost her son, was sent back to the colony for further serving her sentence.

The death of her son was a big blow to the convict, as a result of which she fell into depression. As a result, the woman was placed in a disciplinary isolation ward for 5 days, and then completely transferred to strict conditions of detention for a period of six months. According to the prisoner, she was regularly subjected to torture and psychological pressure during this time. Unable to withstand the malicious insults, the woman swallowed a metal spoon; she was operated on. At the same time, all the complaints about the actions of the employees of the institution, which she wrote, didn’t go beyond the walls of ЛA 155/4.

At the beginning of April this year, the prisoner was again transferred to the disciplinary isolation ward. According to the Coalition of NGOs against Torture, the administration of the colony had no grounds for transferring the woman to the disciplinary isolation ward.

In the disciplinary isolation ward, the prisoner was raped by one of the colony’s employees.

“N. unable to withstand the pressure from the administration of the institution, being on the verge, she swallowed a nail and on the night of 07.03.2021 was urgently placed in the Central Regional hospital of Ili region,” the open appeal says.

Based on the above, human rights defenders ask prosecutors to investigate this complaint under three articles – torture, rape and driving to suicide.