The Monitoring of violation of freedom of speech in Kazakhstan in June 2000

The film-crew of the television company KTK, including the correspondent Perezat Amirkulova and the cameraman Alexandr Kolesnikov, was fired at during conduction of raid in Chaldaisky surviving coniferous forest. The shots rang out, when a car with inspectors of Pavlodarsky territorial administration of state control after flora and fauna and the journalists drove out to the glade, where poaching chopping took place. Despite of the inspectors’ call, the police of Sherbaktinsky district department of internal affairs did not come.

On the next day, according to P. Amirkulova, a stranger called to her house and said the following: “Girl, don’t even think about broadcasting the story”.

TV “Otyrar”, Shymkent City

The film-crew of television channel “Otyrar” was attacked, during their attempt to clarify if the leadership of “Shymkent Transport Agency” was on the territory of the joint-stock company, by the guard on duty, who went for them with fists and swear words. So the journalists didn’t get any information.

MTRK, Tulegen Imanov,

The director of the enterprise “City Water Supply” of Petropavlovsk City A. Baboshko, attacked the television cameraman of the municipal television channel Tulegen Imanov, while he was shooting a story about illegal export of sand by employees of “City Water Supply” from the shore of Ishim. Attempting to hinder the shooting, Baboshko broke the tripod of the camcorder. All of this took place during the presence of the representative of transport prosecutor’s office.

The employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Pavlodar City refused to give explanations and did not permit the film-crew of KTK to the place, where the illegal chopping of the surviving forest took place, according to journalist’s information.

Actions, which hinder the legal professional activity of a journalist, by means of forcing him in any way to disseminate or refuse to disseminate information constitute constituent elements of a crime, provided for by the article 155 of the Criminal Code of the RK. The qualified constituent elements of this crime (part 2 of the article 155) form actions with utilization of one’s official position, use of force or threat of its use.

The cases about crimes, which are provided for by the aforementioned article, according to article 32 of the Code of criminal procedure of the RK, relate to the category of cases of public accusations. Such cases have to be initiated by inquirer, investigator, head of the investigation department of a corresponding territorial subdivision of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the RK or by the prosecutor and are not subject to termination in case parties of a criminal procedure reach agreement. The absence of due reaction of aforementioned officials to criminal actions does not hinder the victim to bring his claim forward.

Unfortunately, despite of the numerous cases of hindering of legal professional activity of a journalist, including use of force, we cannot give any example of bringing to responsibility and punishment of the guilty.

“Do e posle ponedelnika”

According to the report of the newspaper “Do e posle ponedelnika”, at night of June 15 to 16, people in civilian clothes burst in the printing house, where the edition of this newspaper was at the printer’s, have captured the driver of this editorial office, forced him to drive to the cemetery of Burundai, where they compelled him to take out the part of the loaded newspaper edition and burn it.

Actions on forcing the employee of the newspaper to destroy part of the newspaper edition, undoubtedly, contain signs of crime, provided for by part 2 of the article 187 of the Criminal Code of the RK “Deliberate destruction or damage of someone else’s property”. It is more likely that such actions need to be also classified on a number of other articles of the Criminal Code, which provide for responsibility, for instance, for officials; due to the fact that it is hard to imagine that some particular individual would need to destroy a newspaper.

“Karavan”, Zaure Zhumaliyeva, Petropavlovsk City

The investigator Buturukov of the City Administration of Internal Affairs of Petropavlovsk City called out the correspondent of the newspaper “Karavan” Zaure Zhumaliyeva and for the third time demanded written explanations of what was the basis for the article “Not the snow cover’s the traces in Timiryazevo”. Meanwhile, decree of initiation of criminal case was not presented to the journalist.

The most frequent cases of criminal pursuit of journalists in connection with implementation of their professional activity - are cases of slander and insult (the articles 129, 130 of the Criminal Code of the RK).

These and some other cases, according to the article 33 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the RK have to do with cases of so called private accusation. Such cases are initiated by the interested party by means of submission of claim directly to court. During submission of the claim to an investigating organ, an investigator or a prosecutor are obliged to send it to the court for examination in essence. If needed, inquiry or preliminary investigation of such cases, is also conducted according to court’s decision (the articles 389-395 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the RK).

Thus, the actions of the employee of the City Administration of Internal Affairs on conduction of inquiry or investigation without presence of corresponding decision of the court are not based on law.

“XXI Century”, Almaty City

In the regular issue of the edition the editorial office of the newspaper “XXI Century” announced to its readers, that the newspaper was forced to go on indefinite leave. The main reasons for this were problems concerned with search of the publishing house, which would dare to print this oppositional newspaper.

“SolDat”, Almaty City

The employees of the tax police came with a check to the publishing house, where the edition of the regular issue of the newspaper “SolDat” was at the printer’s. The director of the publishing house right there refused to provide services for the newspaper, saying that he did not have any pretensions to the newspaper, but cooperation with it was dangerous, because the police would always find a reason for a fine and closing of the enterprise. The printing of the issue was not finished and was not brought out.

The monitoring issues of the Foundation “Adil Soz” on numerous occasions recorded facts of interference with production process of some newspapers of representatives of state agencies and creation of image of unwantedness of these mass media in the eyes of contractors. Despite of illegality of such actions, the newspapers this time also did not find protection from the law enforcement organs.