Kyrgyzstan Death in Custody Cases Reach UN

NEW YORK—The government of Kyrgyzstan’s repeated failure to investigate adequately deaths in police custody is being challenged by two new cases brought before the UN Human Rights Committee by the Open Society Justice Initiative.

“The lack of accountability for police abuses, including beatings and deaths in custody, remains a widespread problem in Kyrgyzstan,” said James A. Goldston, executive director of the Open Society Justice Initiative. “The government must do more to investigate all torture allegations and provide meaningful redress for victims and their families.”

The Justice Initiative is providing legal representation for two families before the HRC over the separate deaths in 2005 of Turdabek Akmatov, at the age of 33, and Rahmanberdi Ernazarov, at the age of 44. The families of both men have spent over 5 years unsuccessfully seeking justice in Kyrgyzstan’s courts.

Turdubek Akmatov was arrested for theft and brought to the police station in the village of Mirza-Aki in Kyrgyzstan, where he was interrogated and held for approximately ten hours and beaten severely. Later that same day he returned home gravely injured. He died a few hours later.

Rahmonberdi Enazarov was detained at the police station in the city of Osh and kept in a police cell with six other men. After two weeks in police custody, he was found lying unconscious and bleeding in the cell. He died shortly after.

In both cases, the police failed to carry out even the most rudimentary investigatory measures, failing to seize important evidence, question key witnesses, or undertake a proper autopsy.

The continued lack of progress on the two cases comes despite a government promise last year to the UN to effectively investigate alleged torture cases.

Kyrgyzstan’s efforts to meet its obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights have lagged in key areas, including developing an independent mechanism for investigating torture complaints, allowing family access to the investigation, establishing adequate criminal penalties for torture, and creating safeguards to stop police abuse in detention, such as immediate access to a doctor and a lawyer.

 “The government has yet to give any indication that it takes its obligations seriously,” Mr. Goldston said.

The Open Society Justice Initiative has also brought before the UN committee the death in police custody of Tashkenbai Moidunov in 2004. It works with local partner organizations across Central Asia to combat the use of torture.

This release is also available in Russian.

Editor's note: In HRC documents pertaining to the petition, the name of the deceased appears as "Ernazarov" due to a misspelling.