Kazakhstan: Still Jailed Despite 2021 UN Immediate Release Call – Eurasia Review eurasiareview.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from eurasiareview.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Kazakhstan maintains public lists of individuals and organisations allegedly connected to "terrorism or extremism" list, and secret "high-risk" or "suspicious" organisation lists circulated to banks. Both lists lead to blocking and denial of bank accounts and numerous other problems. "We ve written more than 10 letters to various state agencies," Protestant Pastor Pyotr Shelepanov of New Life Church in Talgar told Forum 18. "But we ve had no real answer." His Church describes the denial of a bank account as "incomprehensible".
Five of the nine known prisoners of conscience jailed for exercising freedom of religion or belief were punished for participating in an online Islamic discussion group. The other four are also Sunni Muslims. Dadash Mazhenov and Abdukhalil Abduzhabbarov are facing torture by being held in prolonged solitary confinement. Mazhenov has been physically tortured, most recently in a January 2022 beating with truncheons which broke his jaw. Abduzhabbarov was not allowed to attend his father s funeral, while Galymzhan Abilkairov was not allowed to attend his wife s funeral.