DUSHANBE, December 3, 2009, Asia-Plus — On Wednesday December 2, border guards at Bishkek airport, Manas, did not allow Tajik human rights activist, Ms. Nigina Bahriyeva, to enter Kyrgyzstan.
Ms. Bahriyeva told Asia-Plus today that she flew to Bishkek yesterday at the invitation of the public foundation, Golos Svobody (Voice of Freedom), to conduct training for employees of the Human Rights Ombudsman Office of Kyrgyzstan.
“When I was passing the passport control, border guards at the Bishkek airport did not allow me entering Kyrgyzstan, saying that I am barred from entering Kyrgyzstan until 2019,” said Tajik human rights activist. “They said that I allegedly had problems with Kyrgyz law enforcement agencies in September 2009; however, they did not clarify what kind of problems and with which Kyrgyz law enforcement agencies I had problems.”
Indeed, Ms Bahriyeva was in Kyrgyzstan last September for the training on use of international mechanisms of protection of human rights; however, they did not explain what Kyrgyz laws she allegedly violated.
According to her, she was not allowed to enter Kyrgyzstan probably because of her assistance to Kyrgyz human rights organizations with monitoring the human rights situation in that country. Ms. Bahriyeva also supposes that she is barred from entering Kyrgyzstan because in recent years, she has trained Kyrgyz human rights activists in how to process documents for lodging them to international courts on human tights.
In the meantime, Radio Liberty’s Kyrgyz Service reported on December 2 that Ms Aziza Abdrasulova, chairwoman of the “Kylym Shamy” (Torch of the Century) human rights center, told RFE/RL that Ms. Bahriyeva might have been added to a “black list” because of her work in monitoring the situation with human rights in Kyrgyzstan”s south, in particular a report she was preparing about the arrests and subsequent sentencing of dozens of people in the southern village of Nookat in October 2008.
Nookat residents had taken to the streets in protest after they were denied the right to celebrate the Eid-al-Fitr festival marking the end of Ramadan in a local stadium. Dozens were sentenced for “organizing unsanctioned mass gatherings that led to mass disorder.” Human rights activists consider the Nookat case a politically motivated move by Kyrgyz authorities against Muslims.
Two Russian human rights activists — Vitaly Ponomarev and Bahrom Hamroev — were deported from Kyrgyzstan”s south on separate occasions earlier this year, RFE/RL’s Kyrgyz Service reported.
