At 7:20 pm on 3 March 2008, the journalist Syrgak Abdyldayev was attacked by unknown persons a few feet from the office of his newspaper, Reporter Bishkek. The attackers came out of a waiting car. Abdyldaeyv is the political editor of Reporter Bishkek. He is the author of many critical articles on current events in Kyrgyzstan and on international politics in the CIS region, and often serves as an independent commentator to news agencies and international organizations. Read More

On 26 February, head of Russian human rights organization Memorial’s Central Asia program, Vitaliy Ponomarev, was denied entry to Kyrgyzstan upon his arrival to Manas Airport in Bishkek. Border police explained that a 5 year travel ban had been placed on Ponomarev by the GKNB – the Kyrgyz security services.
Kyrgyz activists and commentators have drawn parallells to a similar incident in October 2008, when the Norwegian Helsinki Committee’s representative in Kyrgyzstan was denied to the country.
Two interesting articles were today published on the matter by the Bishkek Press Club.
Sardar Bagishbekov, head of the Voice of Liberty, explains the wider international implications of the deportations in an interview.
Read the english translation here
Dinara Oshurakhunova from the Coalition for Democracy and Civil Society sets the deportations in the context of tightening control of Kyrgyz NGOs in another interview.
Read the english translation here

Three of the prize winners for this years press prizes ”Free Press of Russia” and ”Free Press of Eastern Europe”, was nominated by the Norwegian Helsinki Committee. The winners were announced by The Freedom of Expression Foundation of Oslo and the ZEIT Foundation of Hamburg this monday. The Russian journalist Zoya Svetova, the azerbaijani journalist Natiq Gavadli and the Azerbaijani newspaper Azaliq will receive their prizes together with the other winners at the Norwegian Nobel Institute on 3 june. The nominations of this year's press prize laureates indicate that the situation for freedom of the press and expression is deteriorating in several Eastern European countries. Attacks on the independent press are illustrated by the never-ending lawsuits filed by the authorities against journalists, editors and newspapers. The authorities use libel provisions to prevent investigative journalism, limit public debate and suppress open criticism of the authorities, high-ranking civil servants or other powerful players. Click on the link below to read more about this years prize winners. Read More

The Swedish and Norwegian Helsinki Committees for Human Rights express their regrets for the repeated failure by the Assembly of Kosovo to appoint a representative for the Ombudsperson Institution and stress the importance of appointing an Ombudsperson with professional and moral credibility and relevant experience from the human rights field at the earliest possible date. Read the letter here

On assignment for the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, freelance journalist Simon Ostrovsky travelled to Turkmenistan to make this rare documentary on one of the world's most inaccessible countries. Since the death of its eccentric first president 2 years ago, the resource-rich Central Asian republic has caught the attention of Western companies in the hydrocarbon sector. Yet its human rights record remains one of the worst in the world.

Join us for a look behind the scenes of President Berdymuhamedov's Turkmenistan.
Watch the movie here

Two organizations, Amnesty International and the Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights (TIHR), published separate reports on human rights in Turkmenistan today, 12 February 2009. Amnesty International's report, entitled "Individuals continue to be at risk of violation", covers a number of disconcerting cases in the Central Asian republic. The report also refers to the Norwegian Helsinki Committee's appeals in the case of Gulgeldy Annaniyazov. The Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights (TIHR) report summarizes human rights developments in Turkmenistan over these past 2 years of Berdymukhammedov's presidency, and is entitled "Human Rights in the Era of the Great Revival of Turkmenistan". The Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights (TIHR) is one of the organizations working on human rights in Central Asia to have received funding from the Norwegian Helsinki Committee.
Read the report from Amnesty here Read the report from TIHR (Russian) Read the report from TIHR (English) Read the NHC statement in the Annaniyazov case

- Yesterday's killing of the human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov underlines the danger in which human rights defenders are working in Russia, says Secretary General Bjørn Engesland. The murder is most likely connected to the human rights work Markelov was doing in Russia. – This is the last in a string of killings and violent attacks against human rights defenders, journalists and lawyers in Russia, says Engesland.
Markelov was one of the few lawyers in Russia that represented victims of atrocities committed in Chechnya. One of his profiled cases was the case against the Russian colonel Yuri Budanov. Budanov was in 2003 sentenced to 10 years for the murder of Kheda Kongaeva, a Chechen girl of 18. Buadnov was released last week 18 months early. The conviction of Budanov is widely viewed as a symbol of human rights abuses in Chechnya. Markelov was shot just minutes after a press conference where he had announced that he planned to challenge the release, and take the case to The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Read More

The Georgian Human Right Centre has handed over documentation detailing allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity during and after the armed conflict between Georgia and Russia to a representative of the Prosecutors Office of the International Criminal Court, Mr. Matthew Brubacher. The meeting took place in The Hague, The Netherlands, on 19th of November.
The Human Rights Centre has documented war crimes and crimes against humanity in the conflict zones throughout the fall of 2008 in cooperation with the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, the Austrian Helsinki Association and Caucasia Centre for Human Rights and Conflict Studies. Regular visits have been carried out to the Gori, Tskhinvali, Kareli, Khashuri and Zugididi regions with the purpose of identifying victims and witnesses to crimes, and documenting such acts by conducting interviews and collecting photographic evidence from the places that suffered most because of the conflict. Read More

The Norwegian Helsinki Committee urges Turkmen authorities to release Gulgeldy Annaniyazov, who was sentenced to 11-year imprisonment by an Ashgabat court on 7 October 2008. The NHC is concerned about the health and safety of Mr. Annaniyazov, held incommunicado since he was arrested on 24 June 2008. Annaniyazov had been living in Norway since 2002, where he was granted refugee status.
Read the statement Read the statement in russian

-Even though we have had differences with South-Ossetia for a long time, we had reached a stage were our peoples did not have much differences any more. We interacted; we traded and crossed the borders back and forth. However, the differences were never solved on a political level, and for the authorities, only war was the solution, the Ombudsman said at yesterdays seminar held by the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, where some 40 participants were present discussing the situation in Georgia after the war. The Ombudsman also pointed to the negative development in Georgia after the Rose revolution in 2003, shattering many of the hopes for a society respecting democracy and human rights. Ombudsman Subari and the Georgian human rights defender Ucha Nanuashvili particularly pointed to the government control over the media, the lack of an independent judiciary and that NGOs no longer is allowed to operate freely in the society.
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